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Tag: Norwegian national team head coach

  • Hetland Named Norwegian National Team Coach After One Year with Canada

    Hetland Named Norwegian National Team Coach After One Year with Canada

    Tor Arne Hetland, a Norwegian gold medalist and world champion in cross-country skiing, will become one of Canada's World Cup coaches. (Photo: FIS/ NordicFocus)
    Tor-Arne Hetland, a Norwegian Olympic gold medalist and multiple world champion, will become the Norwegian National Team Coach in the 2015/2016 season after a year as Canada’s World Cup Coach. He has also coached with the German and Swiss National Teams. (Photo: FIS/ NordicFocus)

    It was announced Tuesday that Tor-Arne Hetland will not return as the Canadian World Cup Coach in the 2015/2016 season. Don’t think his loss of a job means he’s unemployed, however, as the Norwegian is headed back to his home country to take over the position of National Team Coach.

    The Norwegian press reported Wednesday that Hetland will replace Steinar Mundal as Norway’s National Team Coach. He will work closely with Head Coach Trond Nystad throughout the season from his post centered in Trondheim.

    According to Nystad, the new appointment is no surprise as the Norwegian staff has considered Hetland a strong candidate for some time. “We have had talks with Tor-Arne awhile considering a replacement for Steinar Mundal. He has accumulated much experience abroad with good results,” Nystad told Langrenn.com.

    The 41-year-old is a gold medalist in the 2002 individual sprint at the Salt Lake games. His other accolades include a silver in the 2006 Olympic team sprint and five World Championships medals – three gold, a silver, and a bronze. He retired from racing in 2009 due to a knee injury and asthma.

    Hetland jumped into coaching the same year as his retirement with a position on the German team. In 2010 he was named the Swiss sprint coach and remained there until 2014, when both he and his wife, Guri Hetland, ended their contracts with the team. After the departure Hetland ultimately landed in Canada where he was the World Cup Coach for the 2014/2015 season.

    According to Hetland, his international coaching experience will provide him the necessary tools to be the Norwegian National Team Coach, a posiiton he doesn’t take lightly. “I think I have gained enough experience internationally to come home to Norway. Now I’m ready for my biggest challenge as a coach,” he said to Langrenn.com.

    “I feel privileged to work in Norway with so many great cross country skiers. This I have been looking forward to for many years, and now I get the chance,” he added.

  • Trond Nystad: I’m Honored to Take This Position

    “I feel like I was the first choice. That’s why I’m sitting here,” Trond Nystad said when he was introduced as the new head coach for the Norwegian national men’s all-round team. Nystad replaces Morten Aa Djupvik, who resigned in April. Nystad served as the head coach for the US Ski Team from 2002 to 2006.

    The Norwegian Ski Association (NSF) initially had a long list of candidates to narrow down. Some of the individuals the NSF approached were not interested, others determined that they didn’t have the time and some were tied up with other obligations. Pretty soon, Trond Nystad was identified as the hottest candidate to replace Morten Aa Djupvik.

    At the end of that process, four candidates interviewed with the staffing firm Adecco Select.

    “We believe Trond Nystad has what it takes to do the job for NSF,” Hedevig Stang Castberg of Adecco Select said to Norwegian news agency NTB.

    “I feel that we have hired a leader who is ready to coach as well as manage the team. Previously, we have been accused of only looking within our own ranks to fill these kinds of positions. This time, we have hired an outside candidate with experience from the United States, Germany and Switzerland,” Hermod Bjørkestøl said. He is the chair of the NSF cross-country committee.

    “He was one of several strong candidates, and I am satisfied with the outcome. Trond has the skills and qualities we were looking for, and we believe we have a strong coaching team in him and assistant coach Steinar Mundal,” national team director Vidar Løfshus said.

    An honor

    Løfshus knows Nystad well from their time in the United States. They both worked together as coaches with the US Ski Team. That bond was one of the reasons Nystad was identified as a strong candidate for the national team coaching position. National team directors like to know who they are working with.

    Nystad said he was “grilled, double-checked and cross-referenced” in a long, exciting and exhausting hiring process.

    “It was a very open, honest and diligent process. I did not choose myself for the position. I am honored to step into this position. It is a privilege to have the opportunity to work with athletes and coaches of this caliber,” Nystad said.

    Goals

    – What goals do you have in terms of results?

    “The Norwegian racers placed well both in the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver and in the 2011 World Championships in Oslo. The biggest challenge will be to improve on those results in a non-championship season. We have to do better at Tour de Ski, and we need a more consistent World Cup results,” Nystad said.

    Nystad considers himself as man who performs well under stress and is a good communicator.

    “I believe I work well in a team,” Nystad said.

    Brothers on the team

    Neither the NSF nor the staffing firm Adecco Select considers it a problem that Trond Nystad’s twin brother Knut Nystad is the head wax coach for the Norwegian national team. They don’t worry that the relationship between the brothers will be a destructive factor.

    – What kind of relationship do you have to your brother?

    “We don’t have any issues. We’ve worked together before in a professional setting, and we agree on a lot of things. He thinks he’s nicer, more intelligent and sexier than me. I don’t entirely agree. That’s a discussion I don’t think we’ll ever finish,” Trond Nystad said.

    Trond Nystad is currently the CEO of a company in Denver, Colorado. That’s a position he has to conclude before he moves back to Norway. Most likely, the national team camp at Sognefjellet in the beginning of June will be Nystad’s first coaching experience with the Norwegian national team skiers.

    From NTB, May 13, 2011. Translation by Inge Scheve