The 30k and 50k at Holmenkollen today were hella good races. As Topher Sabot says at Fasterskier, the long mass-start race has been improved dramatically by
several clever decisions by FIS. The addition of bonus World Cup points at intermediate distances manufactured attacks and despite many of the drawbacks of ski switching, the ability to stop and swap skis created another opportunity for strategy and breakaways.
Kudos to the Capol, Ulvang, and the rest for making mass starts interesting and competitive again. I hope it keeps up.
Rather than recapping the races (which has already been done well at Fasterskier for both the men's and the women's races and at Nordic Xplained for both), I'll skip straight to the fool's errand of trying to pick the podiums for the freestyle sprints. Skiing 30,000 and 50,000 meters on Saturday will, I think, keep both Bjørgen and Northug out of the limelight on Sunday - and the rollercoaster courses, which include very little flat terrain, will be tough on the rest.
1. Kowalczyk
2. Falk
3. Fabjan
Randall: final
1 comments:
anyone else think the finish of the Oslo sprint course is complete shite?
I'm pretty sure I don't want to see people free skate across the line at 40 km/hr at World Champs. Make them work for it.
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