Cross-Country Skiing 2023 - 2024 Discussion Thread

[Totallympics 55]

[Grassmarket 2,760]

Norwegian roller ski racing on FTA - a hill climb (highlights) & 2 50km mass starts.

 

https://tv.nrk.no/serie/skishow-paa-sommerfoere/2023/MSPO40320223/avspiller

[Grassmarket 2,760]

More Norwegian roller skiing this weekend.

 

https://tv.nrk.no/serie/toppidrettsveka/2023/MSPO40330123/avspiller

[Grassmarket 2,760]

First snow races of the season from Khanty-Mansiisk .  Classic sprints today, 10km Ж & 15km М tomorrow.
 

 

Edited November 10, 2023 by Grassmarket

[Grassmarket 2,760]

5 hours ago, Grassmarket said:

First snow races of the season from Khanty-Mansiisk .  Classic sprints today, 10km Ж & 15km М tomorrow.
 

 

Finals start at 2h 36m on the tape. Frankly….the new generation look scarily good!

[phelps 6,893]

24 minutes ago, Grassmarket said:

Finals start at 2h 36m on the tape. Frankly….the new generation look scarily good!

2 years (and counting) without a doping test...sure, they look good   

 

waiting for their return on the main International stage...dominant as not even in the good old Soviet age  

Edited November 10, 2023 by phelps

[heywoodu 13,562]

Meanwhile in Brazil the South American Championships are going on in 30 degrees (in the early morning, after 9am it goes way above that, up to 37-39 later in the day). Yesterday were the freestyle sprints, with Victor Santos taking the men's title, ahead of Rhaick Bomfim, who competed in the early 2020 Youth Olympics and then just stopped altogether, but managed to get out of the situation and pick up the training again. Sebastian Endrestad made the podium somewhat international with a bronze medal for Chile. Claudio Gustavo Oliveira was the fastest in qualifying, but in finals had to compete with the juniors.

https://www.fis-ski.com/DB/general/results.html?sectorcode=CC&raceid=43871

 

In the women's qualifying, Duda Ribeira was the fastest, but to everyone's surprise - her own, her coach, her competitors - she was then basically forced to start in the junior's final, where she apologized to the other juniors who were definitely not counting on that. It was also a shame for the senior race, where a nice fight between Duda and our very own Totallympian @brunamoura was expected, but yeah, that didn't happen.

https://www.fis-ski.com/DB/general/results.html?sectorcode=CC&raceid=43872

Edited November 20, 2023 by heywoodu

[heywoodu 13,562]

Saturday was the second race of the South American championships, distance classic. As usual 5k for the women, where Totallympian Bruna was once again the fastest, although Duda Ribera surprised by being only 3,5 seconds behind - she is normally much more of a sprinter. Mika Picin, who is usually stronger in longer distances, came up short and finished in third place.
https://www.fis-ski.com/DB/general/results.html?sectorcode=CC&raceid=43876

 

The men's 11km race went to Norwegian Chilean Sebastian Endrestad, who was 12 seconds faster than Brazilian junior Claudio Gustavo Oliveira - currently probably the strongest of the Brazilians who live and train in Brazil. Victor Santos, the one the federation usually wants to put on the forefront, was 52 seconds behind in third.
https://www.fis-ski.com/DB/general/results.html?sectorcode=CC&raceid=43875

 

After a rest day on Sunday, yesterday the next series of races started. These are not South American championships anymore, but only part of the regular Brazilian rollerski circuit. It started off with a freestyle mass start, where Duda was simply a bit too strong. Bruna was in the lead in the last part, but didn't have the power to hold off a strong final sprint by Duda. Once again, Mika was the third wheel on the bike and finished third.
https://www.fis-ski.com/DB/general/results.html?sectorcode=CC&raceid=43866

 

The men's race saw a tight final sprint as well, but with a slightly bigger group. It was Endrestad who again took the win by overpowering the rest in the final few hundred meters, Victor finished in second and Martin Flores in third. Fourth place for Yona Fernandez, which makes it three Chileans in the top-4.
https://www.fis-ski.com/DB/general/results.html?sectorcode=CC&raceid=43865

 

Also, I am frankly somewhat angry at the races even happening. Cross-country races are not even allowed to go on when it's -20 degrees Celsius or colder (measured at the coldest part of the track), but for high temperatures, FIS rules only state that it's up to the technical delegate (which in races like in South America or the Balkan is usually someone with close ties to the organization).

 

It was already awfully hot in the South American championships races, but yesterday it was even worse: the women started at 08.30 for example, and whereas the official results sheet that was sent to FIS listed 23 degrees as starting temperature, in reality it was already well over 30 degrees, by the time they finished (not even 20 minutes later) it had already gone up to 36 degrees. And that was not even the last racing of the day, the para-athletes still race after all that. Doing a cooldown after the race was barely even possible, because how are you going to do a cooldown when the temperature is literally higher than a healthy human body temperature?

 

The women's race yesterday already saw a DNF purely because of the heat, 16-year old Julia Reis (who will be Brazil's representative at the Youth Olympics this winter) became unwell due to the heat....and again, it was not even 9am yet. Today is classic sprint day, so shorter but even more intensive and also, later in the day, because there's qualifyings first and then heats and finals and such, and the organization has declined the idea to move the starts to 7am. It's going to be even warmer today and probably tomorrow for the skiathlon as well, I am honestly worried about the health of the athletes and find it irresponsible for these races to go on...

[Grassmarket 2,760]

Like the biathlon last weekend, we get a double bill of National Races this weekend.  And, strange to relate, both Norway and Sweden are following pretty much the same racing programme.

 

Friday - Classic Sprints

Saturday - 10km Classic ITT

Sunday - 10km Freestyle ITT

 

Here's your link for the FTA  races from Beitostolen.

 

Langrenn – NRK TV

 

 

Edited November 15, 2023 by Grassmarket

[Grassmarket 2,760]

And here's your link for the not-FTA   races from Gallivare

 

Längdskidor: Gällivare | SVT Play