Falun Double Pursuit Predictions

While one of the four predictors had a pretty good showing with the women's prologue, no one would say that the co-bloggers and commenters had their finest hour with the men's prologue. Ain't none of us the King of Mördarbacken.

Petter, pooped, puttered and disappointed everyone except ADS, who put him in fifth, two spots higher than His Sneerness's final spot. Even beyond putting Northug in first, Christopher's revised men's picks proved to be his worst of the Challenge, amassing 36 points thanks to three bad misses (Legkov: picked for 2, actually 16; di Centa: 3/14; Bauer: 5/24). At 29 points, Colin was 20% better better, missing on Legkov and Vylegzhaninininin (5/25) but making up for it with great picks of Angerer (2/4) and Cologna (3/2). Keeron, who can apparently be talked into anything, made some picks that turned out quite well, including a dead-on 4/4 pick of Angerer and a 3/2 pick of Cologna, to hit 26 points. And with 25 points, ADS showed that he can predict his way into good late-season shape, scoring well on Angerer, Cologna, and Northug. (We won't mention the miss on Pietro Piller Cottrer).

My takeaways. 1) In-form Russian distance racers aren't going to do well in short prologues, even if they're basically just hillclimbs. 2) Conversely, Germans, even Germans who haven't had any good races all year (Rene!), are good bets in hill prologues. 3) The racers vying for the overall titles are going to try real real hard to win. 4) Alex Harvey is fast.

The prologue results have altered my thinking about Saturday's double pursuits - 2x5 for the women and 2x10 for the men. Since this is Falun, the courses ascend the Mördarbacken: twice for the women, four times for the men, putting the climbers at the fore again. And the prologue gave a nice little bump to the Swedes, including the Olsson family, Marcus Hellner, and especially Charlotte Kalla. (The preceding sentence is only partly an attempt to trick Colin into putting Hellner on the podium.) 

CHRISTOPHER'S PICKS

women's 2x5k double pursuit
1 Kalla
2 Kowalcyzk
3 Majdic
4 Steira
5 Sachenbacher-Stehle
alternates
6 Follis
7 Olsson

men's 2x10k double pursuit
1 Cologna
2 Northug
3 Angerer
4 Clara
5 Teichmann
alternates
6 Harvey
7 Olsson (not a typo)

COLIN'S PICKS
1 Kalla
2 Kowalczyk
3 Majdic
4 Follis
5 Nystad
Alt
6 Kristoffersen
7 Saarinen

1 Northug
2 Angerer
3 Teichmann
4 Cologna
5 Jauhojaervi
alt
6 Vyleghzhanin
7 Piller Cottrer

COLIN'S COMMENTARY
Not much to say here. The top 3 women are pretty obvious. I think Follis is a great skate sprinter and can hang for 5k of classic, and Nystad obviously found some form yesterday, so let's go with that.

For the men -- how can you bet against Northug? I see him taking advantage of the two Germans yet again in a big group finish. The last time up the Mordarbacken should be a wicked throwdown, but Northug's shown he can hang with the big guns' attacks in the past. Cologna should be up there too, and Jauhojaervi's show good form recently and is a better sprinter you think.