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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: Yolaine Oddou

Crawford, Bédard Finish Job at Canadian Championships with Pursuit Wins

Rosanna Crawford (r) looks back at Claude Godbout before leaving the range to ski one penalty lap on the last stage of the 10 k pursuit at the Canadian Biathlon Championships in Valcartier, Quebec, on Sunday. Crawford went on to win by 11.6 seconds over Godbout.

VALCARTIER, Québec – As she rounded the penalty loop at Myriam Bédard Center on Sunday, Rosanna Crawford looked up and threw down her headband.

Winning the pursuit wasn’t going to be a walk in the park at the Canadian Biathlon Championships, and the 23-year-old from Alberta needed all the firepower she could muster.

Rosanna Crawford soaks up her 10 k pursuit victory at the 2012 Canadian Biathlon Championships in Valcartier, Quebec, on Sunday.

But the shooting portion was over; Crawford missed one shot in each of the last three stages for three total misses. The final one proved to be the most crucial.

A few seconds behind, Claude Godbout of Québec had worked her way from starting fourth, 15 seconds after Crawford, to skiing in second in the 10 k pursuit. After shooting clean on the last standing stage, she was in contention for first.

Watching Godbout emerge from the range, Crawford sped up to exit the penalty and skied out in front of her. The two raced together for about half of the 2.5 k loop, then Crawford capitalized on the long downhill and secured an 11.6-second victory over Godbout.

“Halfway around the penalty loop, I hear the range go crazy so I knew that she had shot clean,” Crawford said. “Right when I heard them cheer I was like it’s on! … She led up the hill and then over the last little bump, I just hammered ahead of her. I had amazing skis today so I was able to rocket down the downhills and get to the finish line first.”

Crawford was pleased with making 17 shots, although she would have liked to have matched her performance on Thursday, when she made 18 to win the 12.5 k mass start. She went on to win Saturday’s 7.5 k sprint.

Canadian pursuit champion Rosanna Crawford (r) congratulates runner-up Claude Godbout on Sunday.

“Skiing has really felt amazing these past four days,” Crawford said after sweeping each race at nationals. “I’m really happy with it and shooting was really good, too.”

As for the psychological aspect of starting first in a pursuit with competitors staggered 5 seconds behind, Crawford said she focused on her own race. She successfully dropped Yolaine Oddou (Québec), who started 5 seconds back in second and finished third (+2:16.9) with four missed shots.

“I just try to … take it one shot at a time, one loop at a time, never really getting ahead of myself,” Crawford said. “It’s just another race but there’s people that are really close behind you.”

Godbout was the biggest threat, closing the gap on Crawford on each lap on her home course. She knew her skis weren’t as fast as Crawford’s and compensated by challenging her on the climbs.

“I knew that to win, I had to gain so much time in the uphill and hope that she wouldn’t catch me on the downhill,” Godbout said. “I was pushing really hard to try to stay with her, but then she beat me at the end.”

Godbout was especially happy to start strong and shoot clean on the first and last stages.

“Yesterday, I missed three standing, and I was with [Crawford] and she cleaned. At the mass start, same thing happened, she missed one and I missed three,” Godbout said. “Today was exactly the same and I was like, ‘Don’t screw up.’ ”

After the race, Godbout said her sports psych congratulated her for keeping it together. She said racing 15 minutes from home helped.

“It’s always fun to race in your hometown,” she said. “We train so hard here and we know the trails perfectly. Just to sleep in your bed is awesome. I think I’m spoiled to do it in my home.”

2012 Canadian Biathlon Championships women's pursuit podium: 1. Rosanna Crawford (center) of Alberta; 2. Claude Godbout (left) of Quebec; 3. Yolaine Oddou (right) of Quebec

Bédard Completes Men’s Sweep

In the men’s 12.5 k pursuit, Marc-André Bédard of Québec started in front and stayed there – but not without a little excitement.

Bédard missed one shot on the first prone, which would have been fine if Scott Gow (Alberta) wasn’t right behind him. Last year’s national pursuit champion, Gow shot clean on the first stage pass Bédard and force him to play catch up after his penalty.

2012 Canadian Biathlon Championships men's 12.5 k pursuit podium: 1. Marc-André Bédard (center) of Quebec; 2. Scott Gow (left) of Alberta; 3. Vincent Blais (right) of Quebec

He did and the two skied together into the second stage, where both cleaned. Fresh off the World Championships in Ruhpolding, Germany, Bédard proceeded to put the hurt on and created a gap that culminated into a runaway victory.

Bédard beat Gow by 1:46.1 to win the pursuit in 40:57, capping off a perfect showing at Canadian Championships. After flying to Canada last Monday, he won every race from Thursday on. Considering the jet lag, he wasn’t sure how he’d fare.

“I was expecting to win, but I was definitely trying to do my best,” Bédard said. “I saw from the first race on that I was faster and I felt good, so from there I wanted to bring them all home, I guess.”

Bédard missed four total shots, including two on the last standing.

“On my last shooting, I was shaky and I was pretty tired,” Bédard said. “That was kind of playing with fire, but I did my loops quick. I didn’t know where Scott was, but I knew if I was with him or in front of him that I should be all right because I still had some energy to fight.”

Gow, who fell behind on the third of five laps, missed one shot on the first standing and three on the second. That gave Bédard even more room to breath after opening hard.

“I had already a good lead so that was fun to be able to finish so easy and enjoy it on the last lap,” he said.

The best shooter of the day with one miss, Vincent Blais (Québec) finished third, 2:29.8 behind Bédard.

Gow said it was beneficial to start closest to Bédard (5 seconds behind) and chase him. Even when he built a significant lead, it helped Gow secure second.

“It kind of just kept me in the race from the get-go,” Gow said. “I think if that hadn’t happened, the race could have been totally different, if I didn’t have him to ski with. When he got really far ahead, I had to push even harder to catch up so it was still good.”

After his penalty lap on the third stage, Gow realized Bédard might be out of reach. He needed to clean the last standing to come close, and he missed three. Regardless, Gow was happy with his effort in his last biathlon race of the season and pleased with his fitness overall.

“Second place is still really good so I’m happy to end it with second,” Gow said. “That’s still fine for me.”

Complete Canadian Championships results

***

Note: Many of the senior men and women will next head to the nearby Canadian Ski National Championships at Mont-Sainte-Anne, Quebec, and participate in strictly cross-country races.

Bédard was excited to race against Alex Harvey in the 15 k freestyle individual start on Tuesday and the skate sprints on Thursday. Gow will finish his season with the 15 k skate and skate sprints.

Crawford said she would do Thursday’s 10 k skate race, the skate sprints and the 30 k classic mass start. She looked forward to racing against her older sister and Canadian National Ski Team member, Chandra, for the first time.

March 18, 2012
After Strong Start from Imrie, Canadian Women Fade From Shooting Errors; Kocher Revives Hopes, Climbs to 13th

Canada's Megan Imrie in the midst of the relay's mass start.

RUHPOLDING, Germany – After a week where not many team members were satisfied with their performances, the Canadian women’s squad crafted a new strategy for the 4 x 6 kilometer relay on Saturday.

In most cases, Megan Imrie and Zina Kocher have skied the first two legs. But not this time: for World Championships, the women wanted to mix things up.

“We just decided to try switching it because usually Megan and Megan and Yolaine are awesome shooters, so we were kind of figuring we’d stay in the game with that,” Kocher told FasterSkier at the finish line.

The plan left Kocher, who has had the best individual results of the team so far this week, to anchor.

Things started out as planned, with scramble leg Imrie using two spare rounds in prone and then quickly cleaning standing and attacking on the final loop to tag off in sixth place.

“Yeah, it was good,” Imrie said. “I did my very best. I had only two spares, so I can say that was good.”

Yolaine Oddou leaving the range.

But from there, things began to fall apart for the Canadians. Like Imrie, second leg Megan Heinicke turned in the twelfth-ranked ski time, but Heinicke used more spare rounds and dropped to eleventh, then twelfth.

“I feel bad, I kind of wrecked our relay here,” a clearly frustrated Heinicke told FasterSkier. “I actually felt good skiing, but it was just too many spares on the range. No penalty loops or anything, but it takes seven or eight seconds to load a spare, so that costs time, and I used four in my race, which is more than I had hoped for.”

When Yolaine Oddou took over, she immediately struggled in prone, using all of her spare rounds and still skiing a penalty loop. She dropped to 16^th, but then climbed one spot to 15^th after hitting all her standing targets on the first attempt.

Nevertheless, it wasn’t where the team was hoping Kocher would begin her anchor leg.

“Yolaine had a bit of a problem in the prone,” Kocher said. “She has kind of been struggling all week, and it was unfortunate. I’m sure she’s sad about it, and quite frustrated – she’s an awesome shooter. Definitely, we could do better.”

Kocher gained a few spots – the team placed 13^th – by using only a single spare over the course of her two shooting stages, which, she pointed out, made the relay her best shoot of the week. She was happy that it could come on a day where her team needed her, but at the same time noted some irony: she needs to achieve a top-16 result in an individual race to resume receiving Athletics Canada funding, and she wouldn’t have minded if she’d shot that well in the individual races.

Overall, Kocher liked racing the final leg.

“My leg was really good,” she said. “I actually haven’t anchored since I was a junior. It was good – I was way more relaxed than when I’m in second. I love being first and second, but it’s more of a tense situation.”

Kocher is the only Canadian woman qualified for Sunday’s mass start so for the others, the relay was the last race of World Championships. Imrie said she milked that fact for all it was worth.

“Walking to the start and hearing all the fans singing along, I was just totally enjoying the music, loving the weather, and everything was great… so it’s a nice way to end it,” she said.

Race Report

Results

Kocher heading back out on course after her prone stage.

March 10, 2012
With Home-Field Advantage, North Americans Flex Their Muscles at Canmore IBU Cup Races

Canada's Marc-Andre Bedard leads Austria's Friedrich Pinter in Canmore on Saturday. Photo: Michael Potter.

Last year, the world’s best biathletes got a taste of northern Maine when the World Cup made stops in Fort Kent and Presque Isle.

This season, the top racers are staying firmly ensconced in Europe. But instead of letting the sport get too comfortable on what could be considered its home turf, the International Biathlon Union (IBU) sent their eponymously named IBU Cup circuit across the Atlantic, and for the last week the “second World Cup” has been contested in Canmore, Alberta.

For the Canadians, bringing the races to their country has been huge. But even the Americans got behind the effort. Continental solidarity was high.

“This is as close to home as I will ever get for an international competition and I’m still in the Rockies, so it feels like home here,” said U.S. biathlete Lanny Barnes, a native of Durango, Colorado, who podiumed in Canmore. “The Canadians have put on some great races and are always very welcoming to the U.S. team. This is probably one of the most beautiful venues on the world.”

Melanie Schultz takes a corner against the backdrop of the Canadian Rockies. Photo: Michael Potter.

On both Saturday and Sunday, the athletes competed in sprints – 7.5 k for women, 10 k for men, a prone and a standing shooting stage apiece. On Wednesday, they doubled their distance for individual races, which featured four shooting stages instead of two and a one-minute penalty for each missed shot. On Thursday, it was back to sprints, and the penalty loop if the athletes made any errors.

Over the four days of racing, North Americans picked up three wins, three more podium finishes, and a total of 21 top-tens.

“These races have been great for Canadian biathlon,” Biathlon Canada High Performance Director Chris Lindsay told FasterSkier.

Nathan Smith, who raced to all three of the Canadian wins at the races, agreed.

“These were the highest caliber races to be held in Canada outside of the Olympics in recent history,” he said. “It’s good for publicity and getting new people involved in the sport. Our team got a lot of medals and top-6 results here… you can feel the team’s momentum.”

Other athletes confirmed that there was a loud fan base for the weekend races, although they lamented lower midweek attendance.

“It was too bad none of the schools came out to watch on the weekdays, but we still have a good number of people out there cheering,” said Canadian biathlete Rosanna Crawford. “Hopefully this will lead to World Cups being held in Canmore.”

Men’s Races: Domination By Smith

Three-time Olympian Robin Clegg placed ninth in Saturday's sprint. Photo: Michael Potter.

The story of the week – not only for the Canadian team, but for the circuit itself – was the near-total domination by 26-year-old Calgary native Smith.

Smith, who trains in Canmore, started out by winning the opening sprint by a mere five seconds over Russia’s Sergey Klyachin; Norwegian Martin Eng, who has an 11^th-place World Cup finish to his name, was another second and a half behind.

In the next sprint, Smith shot clean and extended his lead, this time finishing 40 seconds ahead of Friedrich Pinter of Austria. After sitting out the individual race, Smith made it three-for-three with a four-second victory over Pinter in Thursday’s race.

“To have my first IBU win in Canmore was… amazing!” Smith told FasterSkier. “I’ve been training here since I started biathlon. I know a lot of the volunteers, so I’m proud that I could reward them in a small way for all their hard work over the years.”

Smith’s path to dominance really started at IBU Cup races in Obertilliach, Austria in December, where he placed third in a 10 k sprint, the first podium of his career.

“The bronze I got in December in Obertilliach was very special,” Smith said. “That was the first time I’d ever put good skiing and shooting together in an international race.”

After two more top-ten finishes in IBU Cup action in January, Smith made a brief jaunt onto the World Cup himself, producing a top result of 47^th in a sprint in Antholz, Italy. When he returned to Canada for these races, he knew he could once again be near the top.

“All year I had been having really good time trials amongst the national team and I was hoping for a breakout performance,” he said.

He got it, and even though Canadian events are sometimes lightly attended by international teams, in this case Smith still had to beat out the IBU Cup’s best. Pinter, for example, has a handful of World Cup podiums to his name and owns a World Championships relay medal; the top three racers in the overall IBU Cup standings were also in the mix.

“The big difference here is how the pack thins out a little farther down the result sheet,” Smith said. “I think it was mostly the slower skiers who were missing. I think my races wouldve been at or very near the top if in Europe…. I was within striking distance of first at the IBU cup in Italy twice except my shooting wasn’t as good.”

Being in familiar surroundings, Smith explained, helped achieve his career-best performances.

“I knew I would have a little leg up on a lot of the other competitors because I got back to Canmore a couple weeks before the first race,” Smith said, before laughing it off. “Fair is fair though, since most of the time its the other way around!”

In the first sprint, Smith was joined in the top ten by three-time Olympian Robin Clegg, who missed two shots to Smith’s one and finished 55 seconds back in ninth.

In the second two sprints, it was Marc-Andre Bedard who kept him company, placing seventh and fifth.

“I had great races, but it didn’t feel like it,” Bedard said of his results. “I think I’m getting in better shape, and it’s just starting to feel good. There were quite a bit fewer people here than in Europe, so that helps the results for sure, but compared to the top guys my ski times are really better [than earlier this season].”

Bedard liked the atmosphere in Canmore, but said that if he could get absolutely everything he wanted, the races would be on the other side of the country: “It was pretty cool, but I’d love to race at home in Quebec once in my life at an international race!”

Jeremy Teela led the U.S. men, finishing 11^th, 13^th, 25^th, and 12^th.

Women’s Races: Depth and Consistency

Canada's Yolaine Oddou was the first North American woman to hit the podium. Photo: Michael Potter.

The North American women couldn’t match Smith’s domination. They did, however, have something else going for them: depth. While a Canadian or American woman never topped the podium, Canadians Yolaine Oddou and Megan Heinicke and American Lanny Barnes all took their turns on the lower steps. Twice, the North Americans placed five women in the top ten.

In the opening sprint, Rosanna Crawford led the way in eighth followed one second later by Oddou in ninth; four more North Americans packed the top twenty.

“I was a bit disappointed in the race Saturday with the missed shot in prone,” said Barnes, who placed 12^th. “You can’t afford to miss on a day like that with perfect conditions. The great thing was we had another opportunity on the same course and same race format to give it another go on Sunday.”

With a fire in her belly, Barnes stepped up her game in the second sprint – as did the rest of the North Americans. Oddou placed third, Barnes and Heinicke tied for fourth, and Crawford and American Laura Spector placed ninth and tenth.

Success continued in the weekday races, with Heinicke placing second and Barnes third in the individual, and then Crawford placing sixth in the sprint and leading teammate Melanie Schultz, Spector, Heinicke, and American Tracy Barnes in a six-through-ten sweep.

At 21 years old, Oddou is in her first season of racing on the IBU Cup, and these were her best results by far. Crawford is a 2010 Olympian, but also considered the races to be highlights.

“It was great to be racing in my home town, and I had my best results of the season and great shooting in all the sprint races,” Crawford told FasterSkier. “I was top Canadian two out of three sprints so that was very exciting for me.”

For Crawford, there was a little added motivation, as her mother had just been through surgery for breast cancer but still managed to get out on the trails to cheer.

“Things had been pretty stressful for me leading into these races,” Crawford said. “But she is such a strong and amazing women and is one of the main reasons I have made it this far in biathlon. She was out there everyday with her cow bells and cheering louder than anyone else!”

Lanny Barnes was the most consistent of the Americans, and was particularly pleased with her podium finish on Wednesday.

“I knew I was in race because I could practically hear the announcer everywhere on course and our staff kept giving me splits of leading the race,” said Barnes, who led through the first half of the race and then regained her lead on the penultimate loop before tiring before the finish.

“I probably started out a little harder than I wanted to, and lost a little time in the end, but was happy that my skiing is coming around,” she explained. “I was bummed that [twin sister] Tracy wasn’t right in there with me, but she is just getting over a cold otherwise I think she might have give me a run for the money!”

Tracy Barnes told FasterSkier that due to illness she had taken the races “one day at a time,” and was happy, though not thrilled, with her performances.

“I’ve placed in the top ten several times this season and know I’m capable of it,” she said.

Race results

February 17, 2012