SalamAkhi

We're somehow still in the game to qualify the women's relay. Barring a major upset, the 8th spot will be disputed between and qualify if : they finish ahead of Poland they finish 8th and Poland finishes 7th qualify if : they finish ahead of France and above or equal 5th Tie if : Poland finishes 6th and France 7th Don't know how the tie is supposed to be broken. Poland would have the 4th best result (which is not counted initially) and the best last race, so ... Now if both teams were to be sent to Final B (likely) France could pull an ultimate bitch move : bring Poland down to ensure a positive outcome Poland is definitely stronger overall and can close faster, but this is short-track.

Le retour. Les quotas sont déjà plus ou moins acquis dans les sports de neige, mais les qualifications sont en cours au niveau de la glace. Short-track (étape 3/4) : 4 athlètes, 10 quotas individuels Epreuve Hommes Femmes 500 0 2 1000 2 2 1500 2 2 Relais Non Non Mixte Oui Ca avait commencé doucement à Montréal sur la première étape, un peu mieux sur la deuxième, ce qui laissait augurer un bon retour en Europe. Que nenni, troisième étape compliquée ce week-end en Pologne, même si on ne s'en sort finalement pas si mal. Quentin Fercoq, le leader de l'équipe est à la rue, et on risque de ne pas avoir de quota sur 500m masculin (distance où il a été médaillé mondial). Il peut encore gratter une place au bénéfice d'un bon dernier week-end mais il va être mal placé au départ de son 500 (quasiment rédhibitoire). Les deux départs individuels sur 1000 et 1500 semblent assurés. Chez les filles on a récupéré un deuxième départ sur 500 (de 1 à 2), et perdu un sur 1500 (de 3 à 2 ce qui fait perdre une athlète à inscrire). On devrait réussir à garder deux départs par course. On a aussi fait un rapproché sur le relais au gré des chutes et des disqualifications (9ème pour 8 qualifiés) et mine de rien, avec le retrait du plus mauvais résultat à l'issue de la dernière étape on a notre destin entre nos mains (il faudra se comparer avec la Pologne). Le relais mixte sera qualifié. Patinage de vitesse (étape 2/4) : 5 athlètes, 5 quotas individuels Epreuve Hommes Femmes 500 0 0 1000 0 0 1500 1 0 3000/5000 1 1 5000/10000 1 0 Mass-start 1 0 Poursuite Oui Non Au bénéfice de son podium la poursuite par équipe masculine a validé son billet, ce qui assure trois athlètes à minima au départ à Milan. Logiquement 4 quotas individuels = 4 athlètes à inscrire chez les hommes, il faudrait que Belloir repasse dans les qualifiables sur la mass-start pour en avoir un cinquième, sachant qu'on pourra normalement aligner un deuxième coureur sur la mass-start en "bonus" même sans avoir deux quotas basiques. Les quotas individuels sont relativement sûrs et on n'ira pas en chercher d'autres normalement. Côté filles le quota de Braun sur 3000 est à confirmer mais elle est plutôt en bonne posture sans forcément avoir son destin entre ses mains. Il faudrait aller chercher un quota sur la mass-start pour obtenir une deuxième fille à inscrire et potentiellement deux départs sur cette épreuve (encore une fois quota bonus). Bobsleigh (étape 1/7) : 6 athlètes, 4 quotas Epreuve Hommes Femmes Monobob - 1 Bob à 2 1 1 Bob à 4 1 - Romain Heinrich et Margot Boch devraient sans trop de problèmes assurer leur place dans les deux épreuves. D'autres équipages seront alignés plutôt en Coupe d'Europe, ce qui reste un moyen d'optimiser son classement, et ça sera à suivre. Chez les hommes avec le système de qualification qui mêle bob à 2 et bob à 4 il y a moins de prétendants puisque les équipages qui ne s'alignent pas à 4 sont hors course. Skeleton (étape 1/7) : 1 athlète, 1 quota Deux athlètes sur le circuit, et comme expliqué au-dessus c'est paradoxalement celui engagé sur la coupe Nord-Américaine qui est le mieux placé, en l'occurrence Lucas Defayet, qui a gagné deux courses à Whistler. Une victoire sur les circuits secondaires (NorAm, Europe et Asie) rapporte l'équivalent d'une 13ème place en WC, ce qui est largement suffisant pour aller chercher son ticket. Le classement n'étant mis à jour qu'après chaque étape de WC il a une "course d'avance". Il va enchaîner à Park City et s'il aligne encore encore deux succès il aura déjà enregistré quatre courses bien solides sur les sept nécessaires au ranking. Autrement dit le job sera quasiment fait avant de revenir je présume sur la Coupe du Monde. Maxime Mingeon a fait la WC de Cortina mais il va redescendre en CE pour la suite, il ne se qualifiera probablement pas.

How many (maximum) athletes can a NOC enter ? Maximum 7 athletes for other NOCs. In this case the total number of entered athletes per gender cannot exceed the number of events for which the NOC has been allocated at least one (1) quota place, plus the higher number of of any additional quota places (more than one quota place) allocated to the NOC for an event, counting only athletes qualified by the SOQCP ranking. As I understand it, one guy qualifying in all events (highly unlikely but nevermind) would potentially open 6 quota for his country ?

No such thing as pushing, Loubineaud is motoring and Deschamps in the back hanging on for dear life re There is an outside chance of medal in Milano.

We're so effin bad

Strange last couple of runners. Jung back with a second best run out of 35th starting position, this tracks is holding really well, that's great. Mingeon dead last despite what looks like a decent run. Correct start, no major mistake or obvious slip, I get that there's some magic in this sport that bare eyes can't decipher but 2,5s is an eternity. How much on the athlete, how much on the sled ?

Between the three favorites the changes between 2022 and 2026 favor (for gold, which is the decider) : - ski mountaineering : none - luge double W : , slightly less - skeleton team event : , maybe - ski jumping large hill W : - parallel moguls W and M : - alpine skiing team event + combined replaced by team combined : status quo - absence of : , less so Even-handed all in all, maybe a bit less favorable to the US.

The quota rule is quite clear, but I failed to find in the official document how many athletes each NOC will be able to enter. In 2022 it seems it was : maximum number of entries in a single discipline + number of remaining individual distances in which you qualify at least one athlete (+ bonus TP + bonus full quota). 7 being the max without a TP. So at the moment France would be able to enter 5 male athletes ? As we speak only 4 would probably start a race but this could be useful for TP duties or else. I really hope one of the girls will get a spot. Braun is only a couple of hundredths away from a time Q in the 3000, let's see what Calgary brings. As for Nizan she's bagged a lot of MS experience on the Dutch circuit but she fell in the last corner yesterday while she was close to a top 3 in the B division. She'll need a good performance in Calgary or qualification will become really unlikely.

Well, you never know how the OKT will unfold. As we speak Groenewoud is definitely in jeopardy, but I doubt she'll miss the Olympics.

Winning in speed skating, fluent English (not Dutch it seems), something is off with this guy.

Good thing is that this will shed light upon the sport in France. Bear in mind not even one press article mentioned the WC start this week and the Games are 99% going to be held outside of the country in 2030 without much turmoil. Bad thing is that now people who knew nothing of the sport besides "you race on ice and the Dutch win in the end" will expect him to win in Milano ...

Surprising indeed, but at 19 Loubineaud was still three years away from recording his first races on ice.

Alright, he should have gone sub-6', this won't last

Under WR-pace with 800m to go but we seemingly were to expect a "6'07" then. Boy was recording only sub-29'' laps but 5'04 ads to 6'07 for some. As if 5000 wasn't the easiest race to read.

This is quite likely though. French skaters should already plan their flight to Italy/the Netherlands for their home Games, how encouraging. There goes your question mark. Is the commentator able to count though ?

Maybe we can get some help from the Netherlands, in exchange for the amazing privilege of hosting the Olympics

You Dutch have more than enough to feed yourself with A divisions though, same cannot be said for every country Yeah I was really looking forward to seeing them skate (which I can't but nevermind). Sadly Violette Braun is 21st time-wise, and I doubt those time will be beaten - we'll see in Calgary and probably Heerenveen for the Chinese/Japanese I guess - so wrong end of the stick for her ...

Disastrous coverage. Still don't get why there is no broadcast of the B races, which they definitely can do. The "live results" is a joke, times are all over the place.

So Fercoq gets past the prelims in the 500m, is illegally brought down in the heats while he was taking up the third spot (could even have secured a q by time) so he's assigned ... a 4th position on the line for the repêchage heat, behind guys who finished 4th in their prelim race. Make it make sense please. The starting position draw is do dumb. Why consider sheer time and not the spot you finish in first ? Why penalize athletes with a terrible position on the line (even if you manage to climb back up your time will be shit and you'll get the same awful position in the next round, against better athletes) though they were "no time" through no fault of their own ? The advancement system is not that bright either. You get free bye if you're tripped in the battle for second in a race where only the first gets the Q, but you're not advanced if you were fighting for third when the race offer 2 Q.

So we're training with Italy (who are not doing that bad) and we've never been that awful. Great.

Going well for Slovenia. They're overperforming as of now (+20) when their direct opponents, Turkey (-27,5) and Ireland (-28) are under-par.

You're complaining far too much

We agree on the outcome. Now calling Loubineaud mid is a bit of a stretch, 12'44 and 6'07 tell he's definitely no slouch. But he won't be able to fight with Bergsma or Swings in a sprint. He was on a downward trajectory in Bejing looking at his 5000 time, so judging his abilities on this mere race isn't really fair. I hope he'll try and change his tactics, which can only lead you so far, in next WC races. He needs to have a back-up plan (and use his teammate, Belloir or an other).

2nd win of the season. No doubt the best year ever for French speed skating with a women's team building in the same time. For Loubineaud these things will happen (like Contin) : 1. He'll draw attention to himself in French media. Which is good because at least there is a project. They don't talk about the sport at all, especially with no rink in France, which suffers from a "poor" image like "ah the Dutch sport, they win all the medals, they exist at Winter Games only because of it, too much medals distributed, it's unfair" (like we didn't boost our total thanks to biathlon and its inflated program). 2. With the Olympics around the corner those media will start to evoke a shot at a medal. 3. If he manages to be successful early in the Olympic season, the bubble will inflate. 4. He won't medal in Milan. The bubble will explode, people will laugh "ah ah all of this for that, typical French Lose mentality". I hope he will. But World Cup and championships are two different beasts. No doubt the Italians will sort a plan out, the Dutch will have to cooperate and appoint a leader, Médard will work for Swings, etc. He won't have an easy way out and I fear he's got no chance if it ends in a massive sprint.

Résultats satisfaisants pour ces deuxièmes CDF délocalisés. Pas de grandes envolées chez les hommes mais la confirmation du potentiel du junior Arthur Lebeaupin, en espérant qu'il puisse au moins prendre part aux Mondiaux de sa catégorie. Chez les filles des records nationaux battus dans toutes les épreuves dont le 500m où Mathilde Pédronno passe sous les 40'' et s'acquitte des minima internationaux. Championnats d'Europe allround ce week-end au mythique Thialf. Deux garçons : Mathieu Belloir et Valentin Thiébault (Loubineaud forfait pour retrouver la forme). Une fille : Julia Nizan (Violette Braun a des examens apparemment). Elle était un peu en dedans lors des France, peut-être pour axer la préparation sur ces championnats "à la maison" (elle s'entraine aux Pays-Bas) ? ---- Et sinon en skeleton Lucas Defayet obtient son meilleur résultat en carrière à Winterberg : 11ème. Avec une grosse deuxième manche et des temps au départ très intéressants. Saint-Moritz vendredi, piste assez "ouverte" aux belles performances.