30km to the End

Though there are many storylines to tomorrow's 30km freestyle mass start race, a dominant one is whether Aino-Kaisa Saarinen can make the podium and thus earn a medal in every event at the Liberec Worlds. A win and a fourth gold would put her ahead of the three-gold hauls of teammate Kuitunen at the '07 Sapporo Worlds and Marit Bjoergen at the '05 Oberstdorf Worlds.

I don't think the gold is in the offing: the brutal 30km course is just too tough. Still and all, a ridiculous 69 women are in the start list, including all the big names except Majdic and, unsurprisingly, Bjoergen. Six North Americans will start: Renner, Swanson, Gaiazova for Canada; Stephen, Arritola, Compton for the U.S.

women's 30km freestyle mass start
1. Kristin Stoermer Steira
2. Charlotte Kalla
3. Aino-Kaisa Saarinen     Renner: top 10

Petra Majdic: Awesome

I'm bummed that Petra Majdic is leaving Liberec without a medal, because she seems pretty cool, as this English-language interview from Swedish TV shows. The bit at 2:20 about the origins of her famous excitability is especially great.

Relay Day II

The women's relay was an incredible contest: Kowalcyzk going out harder than hard at the start, Japan hanging in third place deep into the third leg, Steira skating so fast that she closed down a 31.8s gap to Finland in just 3500 meters, giving Kristoffersen an 8.2s lead at the start of the fourth leg. And then the fourth-leg war between Kristoffersen, Saarinen, Nystad, and Kalla - wow. Every medal was in play at the start the last leg, and the silver and bronze were up for grabs until the finish line. I have to think the Norwegian coaches will be rethinking their relay-team selection process after seeing poor young Marthe collapse on the anchor leg, sliding from gold down to fourth. Ouch.

We'll be lucky if the men's race is half so interesting. There should be a biggish pack (five teams, maybe?) right up to the anchor leg, at which point the attacks will come and the jet-powered one will emerge. I can't see the Czech team pulling out a win, much less a medal: Bauer and Koukal (2 and 4) can make up entirely for Jaks and Magal (1 and 3). My picks:

men's 4x10km relay
1. Norway (Roenning, Hjelmeset, Hofstad, Northug)
2. Sweden (Rickardsson, Olsson, Soedergren, Hellner - what, no Matti Fredriksson?)
3. Italy (Clara, Checchi, Piller Cottrer [who's had a bad Worlds, no?], di Centa)
     U.S. (Freeman, Cook, Southam, Newell): top 15
     Canada (Kershaw, Grey, Babikov, Harvey): top 10, inside 2:00 of the winner

Relay Day I

Man, the sprint events have been good appetizers* for the main course: the four days that include the women's and men's relays (Thursday and Friday) and the 30km and 50km freestyle mass start races (Saturday and Sunday). The Vasaloppet - effectively the world ski marathon championships - occurs on Sunday, too, as a sort of dessert.

The women's relays are almost always good for a surprise and some good competition. At Torino, the surprise came when Norway failed to medal in the event; the competition in the tight race between Germany and host Italy for the silver and bronze (behind Russia). At Sapporo, the surprise came when Virpi Kuitunen used her lead leg to destroy the field; the competition in German anchor Evi Sachenbacher-Stehle's climb from fourth at her handoff all the way up to silver.

Based on the strong showings by Saarinen in the 10km (an event in which Kuitunen just missed the bronze), Muranen in the sprint, and Kuitunen and Saarinen in the sprint relay, Finland appears ready to defend its title. My picks:

women's 4x5km relay
1. Finland (Muranen/Kuitunen/Roponen/Saarinen -- they'll win going away)
2. Norway (Bjoergen/Johaug/Steira/Kristoffersen -- what, no Jacobsen for spills and thrills?)
3. Sweden (Andersson/Norgren/Haag/Kalla -- I can see this team being a mess on the tracks, but the I'm trusting Kalla's mostly-fresh legs to keep them in contention)
Italy (Confortola/Longa/Valbusa/Follis) will be close behind, but I think the success of Longa and Follis will work against them in the relay.

* Joo see Japan hang with Sweden and Italy right into the last lap of the sprint relay? Wow. A shame they had to accept the wooden medal.

An Ode To Kristin

One of the greatest things about fantasy sports is that it allow you to develop a bizarre, one-way bond with an athlete, where you spend an entire season being a superfan all because you put down more imaginary money next to their name than anyone else. If this athlete happens to be an attractive member of the opposite sex, all the better -- and if you'd like to argue with my definition of "attractive" you should know that I consider scary fastness to be really hot.

Anyhow -- two years ago I spent a whole season developing a bizarre affection for Kristin Steira, as she carried my fantasy team to a season win, and this affection was in no way reduced by this video. This year, I gloriously predicted Justyna Kowalczyk to win the World Cup Overall (let's not forget my co-blogger picked Astrid Jacobsen) and put my money where my mouth was with a huge fantasy bid for her.

So Saturday's pursuit was basically the happiest I've been watching a ski race in years.

Here's the thing -- Kristin Steira can't sprint. She is a female version of Anders Soedegren. Her sprinting claim to fame is finishing 56th/60 in a Tour de Ski Sprint in 2006. So when the lead group of five transitioned onto skate gear in the pursuit, she knew the only way she was going to win a world championship gold was to reduce that group to one person.

Steira went to the front and drilled it. For 7.5k. A rarity, in the new hey-let's-all-draft-till-the-finish style of mass start racing. No one came around her, and it wasn't that they were being clever and forcing her to work -- they just couldn't.

After 2.5k, all four were still there. She opened a gap on the big hill, prompting Kowalczyk to move all the way from fifth up to second to close it (what were you doing back there anyway, Justyna??) but eventually it all came back together. Some people -- for example, anyone in the men's field -- would have given up at this point and started being "tactical," which is to say "boring."
Kristin instead decided to try punching everyone else in the face again to see who could really hang. Maybe her coaches told her that everyone was in difficulty last time she did that, or maybe she just knows that people don't generally like chasing the lightest person in the race up the steepest hill in the race. In any case, on lap two Shevchenko and Longa were immediately evicted from the front group, with Saarinen hanging on by the thinnest of margins. Only Kowalczyk (whom I predicted would be very good this year, in case you forgot) seemed to be handling Steira's pace.
On the third lap, Steira kept the hammer down and put away Saarinen easily, whittling the group to two. Kowalczyk continued to look relatively comfortable, but Kristin didn't care; she just stayed in front and kept the pace as high as possible for as long as possible.

On the second to last climb, Justyna made a play for my heart by attempting to come around, but Kristin was so determined to lead -- even faced with the reality that Kowalczyk was feeling at least as strong as her -- that she would have none of it, any drag raced the Pole side by side to the top.
In the end, Kowalczyk won, because she has more than zero fast twitch muscles in her body AND she was the only woman in the whole field that could even stay in Steira's draft. Had it been an interval start, I assume Steira would have won -- but it wasn't, so she didn't, but at least gave us a hell of a show in the process.

Liberec Team Sprint

Well, ain't Kikkan wonderful? A silver is a damn good result for the Red-Haired One. Now let's see what those Norwegians can do in the team sprint.

women's classic team sprint
1. Italy (Longa & Follis)
2. Finland (Kuitunen & Saarinen)
3. Russia (Shapovalova & Matveeva)
U.S. (Valaas & Randall): top 10

men's classic team sprint
1. Norway (Kjoelstad & Hattestad)
2. Sweden (Joensson & Larsson)
3. I got no idea
U.S. (Freeman & Koos) and Canada (Grey & Kershaw): top 10

World Championship Sprints

If the pursuits were any indication, the freestyle sprints at Liberec will be won and lost on the last climbs of the course. (course profile) My picks, including the splash of the "WTF?" that seems to flavor the big sprints - Crawford and Darragon at Torino, f'instance. (This is really just a way to say "who the hell knows, if your name's neither Majdic nor Hattestad.")

women's freestyle sprint (96 racers on the qualification-round start list!)
1. Majdic
2. Muranen
3. Brun-Lie
Randall: top 12

men's freestyle sprint (135 racers on the qualification-round start list!)
1. Hattestad
2. R. Pasini
3. Jönsson
Newell: top 12
Harvey and Koos: top 20