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From the FasterSkier archive — posts syndicated from athletes’ and coaches’ own blogs between 2004 and 2012, kept online as published. Current coverage is at fasterskier.com.

Tag: Kimberly Del Frate

  • Elena Ankudinova, the Russian Nobody Expected, Picks Up First World Juniors Win in Kontiolahti Sprint

    Elena Ankudinova, the Russian Nobody Expected, Picks Up First World Juniors Win in Kontiolahti Sprint

    Canada's Emma Lodge and U.S. biathlete Kimberly Del Frate on course in Kontiolahti. Photo: Judy Geer.

    Despite the presence of several former champions in the field, a new gold medalist rose to the top at biathlon’s World Youth and Junior Championships in Kontiolahti, Finland on Saturday: Elena Ankudinova.

    The diminutive Russian was perfect on the range and collected an eight-second victory in the junior women’s 7.5 k sprint. She bested, among others, Tuesday’s individual champion, Chardine Sloof of the Netherlands; last year’s youth individual champion, Thekla Brun-Lie of Norway; and teammates Elena Badanina, who won both the youth sprint and pursuit in 2010, and Olga Galich, that year’s youth individual champion, who also tied for the youth sprint title in 2009.

    It may not have had quite the story of Sloof’s first-ever Dutch victory earlier this week, but Ankudinova’s dominance was definitely a surprise. This is her first trip to the Championships, and after finishing 17th in the individual race she hadn’t even been selected for Russia’s relay team on Thursday.

    Ankudinova told the IBU that her win was a relief to the whole team. The Russian women had previously received only one medal in these Championships, a third-place finish by Badanina in the individual, and both their youth and women’s teams placed fourth in the relays.

    The team tripled their medal count on Saturday, with Margarita Phillipova taking home bronze 16 seconds behind Ankudinova. The teammates were separated by Anais Chevalier of France, who told the IBU after the race that she has gold in her sights on Sunday’s pursuit.

    And looking back? Perhaps the Russians wish they’d put Ankodinova on the relay team, after all.

    Vaillancourt 16th for Canada

    Keely MacCulloch en route to 40th place. Photo: Judy Geer.

    For the second time this week, Audrey Vaillancourt led the Canadian contingent with a result in the mid-teens. After finishing 15th in the individual race, the Quebec City native almost repeated her performance in the sprint, placing one spot down the ladder in 16th. Vaillancourt had a single penalty and finished a minute and a half behind Ankudinova.

    “I indeed had a very good race today,” Vaillancourt wrote in an e-mail. “My plan was to have a strong start and try to keep that pace all the way through the race, so I had a very fast first lap. Unfortunately in my last lap I couldn’t push the pace any faster, so I just made my way to the finish line with the very little energy I had left! It was worth going as fast as possible from the beginning though; every second counts in a sprint.”

    Vaillancourt’s penalty came in her prone stage, but she said the error did not affect her confidence, and that she was pleased with only a single penalty.

    Emma Lunder and Keely MacCulloch placed 39th and 40th, just over three minutes out of the win. Canadian coach Richard Boruta said that “the current ski speed is not quite where it needs to be for this level of competition.”

    But the result was actually a strong showing for MacCulloch, for whom this is the first international race trip.

    “It has been such an exciting experience,” MacCulloch told FasterSkier. “Honestly I didn’t have a clear goal set up for World Juniors because I was just thrilled that I even made the team. Finishing in 40th place today was exhilarating especially since I wasn’t able to race the relay, not to mention I moved up ten places from the individual.”

    After the individual race, where she placed 50th, MacCulloch did have a tiny bit of experience to draw on, and used it to stay focused. Like Vaillancourt, she ran out of gas on the last loop.

    “I left the penalty loop ahead of several of my competitors and tried to ski as fast as I could for the last lap… I think most of those I’d left in the range caught up to me on the downhill,” MacCulloch said. “The course has one long, steep hill that competitors must go down and then back up. Going up that hill the final lap as fast as I could was extremely tiring, and I do wish I could have pushed myself a bit harder.

    “However it was still a terrific experience and I’m so glad it went as well as it did.”

    Emma Lodge will join the team in the pursuit after placing 56th.

    Tough Day for U.S. Women

    Kimberly Del Frate racing down the finishing stretch. Photo: Judy Geer.

    The Americans were dismayed that, Kelly Kjorlien, who had placed 39th in the individual race, encountered major equipment problems and had to drop out of the sprint.

    “Our top athlete Kelly Kjorlien’s rifle started malfunctioning for prone shooting, and then stopped firing during standing,” said U.S. coach Algis Shalna. “Kelly had to stop the race. The biggest disappointment for Kelly and us was that she is not in the pursuit now, and competition is over for our top junior woman.”

    The other U.S. entrants were Alaskan twins Kimberly and Amanda Del Frate, who missed four and five shots to place 55th and 60th.

    “We do not consider it a big success to just to make pursuit, but for them being their first time at Worlds, it’s a respectable performance,” Shalna said.

    Kimberly Del Frate told FasterSkier that her experience so far had been “eye-opening.”

    “I guess for today’s race you could say I’m not unhappy with my shooting because it could have been worse, but it also could have been better,” she said. “I try to take each race as it comes and not stress the small things too much. Biathlon being what it is, you can’t really focus too much on what has happened or what you want to happen. You just have to trust your training, be confident, and focus only on what you can control. That’s really all you can do.”

    Full results

    Vaillancourt leading Amanda Del Frate. Photo: Judy Geer.
  • Del Frate Repeats, But Three New Victors Emerge at Day Two of Biathlon Junior Trials

    Del Frate Repeats, But Three New Victors Emerge at Day Two of Biathlon Junior Trials

    Danika Frisbie (Vermont Collegiate Biathlon) and Tara Garaghty-Moates (Vermont Biathlon/Craftsbury) in line to start. Photo: Judy Geer.
    Danika Frisbie (Vermont Collegiate Biathlon) and Tara Garaghty-Moates (Vermont Biathlon/Craftsbury) in line to start. Photo: Judy Geer.

    The format and selection procedures at World Youth/Junior Biathlon Championships Team Trials were explained in Wednesday’s report on the sprint races.

    A new day, a new format, and only one of four winners was able to remain at the top of the podium in the second day of competition at World Youth/Junior Biathlon Championships Team Trials in Anchorage, Alaska.

    Andrea Mayo, 4th place junior women. Photo: Judy Geer.

    That biathlete, Kimberly Del Frate of Alaska Nordic Racing and Alaska Biathlon, did so with aplomb, too: she finished more than three minutes ahead of second-place racer Danika Frisbie of Vermont Collegiate Biathlon in the junior women’s 10 k pursuit. Del Frate was by far the fastest skier in the field, and also had among the best shooting; her six penalties over four stages tied her with Frisbie and Silke Hynes, also of Vermont Collegiate Biathlon.

    In a true pursuit, athletes start in the order that they finished in the previous sprint, with time gaps maintained from the final results, and shoot two prone stages and then two standing stages for twenty shots total. As in a sprint, missed shots mean a trip to the penalty loop. In selection races, the U.S. Biathlon Association jettisons the start order and time gaps, maintaining only the distance and shooting format.

    So rather than extend an already minute-plus lead from the sprint, Del Frate started 18 of 20 bibs in the youth and junior women’s field, and instead worked her way through her competitors to be the third girl across the finish line. Del Frate’s twin sister Amanda placed third for the second race in a row.

    “We’re pretty even,” Kimberly Del Frate said of her sister in a recent profile in Alaska’s channel 11 news. “Sometimes I tend to be a faster shooter, but not necessarily more accurate. I get more nervous when she’s shooting next to me than when other people are because she’s my sister and that competitive sister thing.”

    Ruzich on course. Photo: Judy Geer.

    In the youth women’s 10 k race, Wednesday’s winner faced some challenges that ultimately dropped her to last in the field. Tara Geraghty-Moates of Vermont Biathlon and the Craftsbury Nordic Ski Club was having the best pursuit of her life until she cross-fired, or shot on the wrong “point” on the shooting range; she was assessed four penalties for missing her own target, but did not realize that she needed to ski penalty loops because she had hit the targets on the other point.

    “This resulted in me getting a two minute penalty [per loop] for the loops I didn’t do, because I thought I had hit four out of five, not none out of five,” Geraghty-Moats told FasterSkier.

    “Whoops,” she concluded.

    Without the eight minute penalty, the Vermonter would have won handily – by a big enough margin that if she had skied four penalty loops, which typically take 20 to 25 seconds apiece, she still would have chalked up her second victory.

    Instead, Vermont Academy racer Mikaela Paluszek picked up her first victory despite missing nine shots, which meant shooting just 55 percent. She edged Nisswa NW’s Jenna Ruzich by twelve seconds; Ruzich had only six penalties. Third place went to Melissa Manning of the Maine Winter Sports Center.

    Near-perfect Smith. Photo: Judy Geer.

    In the junior men’s 12.5 k pursuit, the sprint victor also suffered on the shooting range, although from more usual errors. Geraghty-Moats’ teammate Ethan Dreissigacker racked up ten penalties; while he shot just 50 percent, fellow junior national team member Casey Smith of Methow Valley Biathlon had a nearly perfect day, missing only two shots and collecting a two-and-a-half minute victory. Smith’s huge victory is all the more impressive because it is his first year as a junior, while the next three finishers are in their last year in the age bracket.

    Maine Winter Sports Center athletes Raleigh Goessling and Ben Greenwald, both of whom represented the U.S. at last year’s World Junior Championships, finished second and third with seven and five misses, respectively.

    The final race, the youth men’s 10 k, was the only one that proved to be a nailbiter. Throughout his race, Sam Dougherty of Alaska Biathlon held the lead. As the previous day’s winner, it didn’t seem surprising – but one minute and two bibs later, Nick Proell of Minnesota Biathlon hit the trails. Both skiers missed two shots in each prone stage, and then Dougherty had one penalty in the initial standing stage while Proell was perfect. In the final stage, Dougherty missed two shots, hit the penalty loop, and jetted off to the finish.

    By the time Proell came into the range, he was leading based on splits. If he had cleaned, he would have had an easy victory – but he missed a shot and had to make a pit stop at the penalty loop before finishing.

    In the end, the Minnesotan, who is set to compete at the Youth Olympic Games in January, was able to squeak out a five-second win over Dougherty thanks to superior shooting. Jake Prince of Alaska Biathlon finished third with four penalties and a time that was just 22 seconds behind Dougherty’s. All three men were repeat podium finishers for the sprint, meaning that they are virtually guaranteed spots on the World Youth Championships team – unless another racer can pop a big win in Friday’s culminating competitions, another set of sprints.

    Full results (Excel spreadsheet)

    Biathletes on the Kincaid Park trail system. Photo: Judy Geer.
    Raleigh Goessling, Maine Winter Sports Center – 2nd place junior men. Photo: Judy Geer.
    Ben Greenwald, Maine Winter Sports Center – 3rd place junior men. Photo: Judy Geer.
  • Dreissigacker, Del Frate, and Geraghty-Moats Dominate as Junior Biathlon Trials Kick Off in Anchorage

    Dreissigacker, Del Frate, and Geraghty-Moats Dominate as Junior Biathlon Trials Kick Off in Anchorage

    Kelly Kjorlien (Mount Itasca) leads Andrea Mayo (BATCave) and Melissa Manning (Maine Winter Sports Center) in the first day of racing in Anchorage, Alaska. Photo: Judy Geer.

    Today in Anchorage, World Youth/Junior Biathlon Championships Team Trials kicked off with a bang – or lots of bangs, as rifles knocked down target after target at Kincaid Park’s world-class shooting range. Thirty-eight athletes from teams in seven different states converged on the Alaskan racing mecca’s trails — which are luckily one of the few spots in the U.S. to have plenty of natural snow.

    The championships themselves won’t happen until February in Kontiolahti, Finland, where youth (17 and 18 years old) and junior (19 and 20 years old) racers will compete for international titles. The U.S. will send up to four athletes of each gender in each age division, with two racers prequalified based on leading the Youth Olympic Games nominees: Sean Doherty of Saratoga Biathlon and Anna Kubek of Mount Itasca, who was also nominated to the senior IBU Cup team last week. In their absence, the rest of the team will be picked by the best two of three races as measured by percent back.

    Sprint racing was the order of the day, with youth men and youth and junior women racing 7.5 kilometers, and junior men 10; Juniors are 19 to 20 years old and youth 17 to 18, although some competitors in the youth division are actually even younger. Sprints consist of only two shooting stages, prone followed by standing, for a total of ten shots for each competitor. Missed shots mean a trip to the penalty loop.

    Dreissigacker. Photo: Judy Geer.

    In the first race of the day, the junior men, Vermont Biathlon/Craftsbury Nordic Ski Club athlete Ethan Dreissigacker was nearly perfect on the range and skied to a 1:17 win over Maine Winter Sports Center’s Ben Greenwald. Both men missed a single shot, Greenwald in prone and Dreissigacker in standing. Starting fourth, Dreissigacker’s skiing propelled him past most of the previous starters; as he neared the finish, he closed in on Casey Smith of Methow Valley Biathlon, but the Washington athlete was able to turn on the afterburners and cross the line first en route to a third-place finish in the division. All three men were members of last year’s team, although Smith was a youth, and this is his first year racing as a junior.

    In the youth men’s race, the margin of victory was a bit smaller with Sam Dougherty, Jake Prince and Nick Proell all finishing within 30 seconds; the men also had three penalties each, meaning that they skied very similar times. Dougherty, the only athlete in the field who has already competed in a World Youth Championships, ended up edging his Alaska Biathlon teammate by 22 seconds, with Minnesota Biathlon’s Proell — who will be representing the U.S. at the Youth Olympic Games in January — finishing just behind them. Two more athletes, Kyle Rutar of Casper Mountain Biathlon and Erik Rupert of the Maine Winter Sports Center, finished within twenty seconds of Proell and remain close in the percent-back rankings.

    Kimberly Del Frate. Photo: Judy Geer.

    Kimberly Del Frate of Alaska Biathlon dominated the junior women’s division, winning by over a minute and a half despite two trips to the penalty loop. While three previous World Youth Championships competitors were in the field, none had represented the U.S. as a junior, and two of them — Andrea Mayo of BATCave and Silke Hynes of Vermont Collegiate Biathlon — finished at the bottom of the field. Kelly Kjorlien of Mount Itasca, a leader of last year’s youth delegation, finished second after cleaning both shooting stages, while Del Frate’s sister Amanda picked up third place with four penalties, narrowly beating out Danika Frisbie of Vermont Collegiate Biathlon.

    Finally, Tara Geraghty-Moats of Vermont Biathlon/Craftsbury Nordic Ski Club won the youth women’s sprint by 1:03 despite hitting just half of her targets. The Vermonter was the only returning team member in the field, and it showed; second-place Melissa Manning of the Maine Winter Sports Center had three penalties and Jenna Ruzich of Nisswa NW four. Using the precent-back measurements, Geraghty-Moats had the most dominant win of the day.

    Racing continues on Thursday with pursuit competitions.

    Full results (Excel spreadsheet)

    Dougherty sprinting off the start line. Photo: Judy Geer.
    (l-r) Dreissigacker, Greenwald, and Raleigh Goessling (Maine Winter Sports Center) settle in on the range. Photo: Judy Geer.
    Geraghty-Moates en route to a big win. Photo: Judy Geer.
    Dreissigacker at the start. Photo: Judy Geer.
    Dougherty, Prince, and Proell on the podium. Photo: Judy Geer.