It is no exaggeration to say that claiming a World Cup start at home, or barring that at least in Canmore, is a season goal for virtually every top domestic skier this year. In Anchorage for Period 1 SuperTour races or in Soldier Hollow for Period 2 national championships, on the record or off, I heard this refrain over and over again from athletes: I want to race at Canmore; I want to start at home at Wirth.
So who’s going? The qualification period for these races, both World Cup–based and domestic, largely ended last weekend, on January 21. (Exception: Athletes with top performances at World Junior or U23 Championships in Planica who have not otherwise garnered a spot can potentially qualify for starts in Wirth via those races in early February.)
The published criteria are known, the World Cup sprint and distance standings are known, and the internal USSS selection lists are known. Proud parents are sharing congratulatory posts headlined “it’s official”; unsupported athletes not on the national team are turning to GoFundMe to help cover their expenses; athletes who weren’t selected are grumbling about this online (not gonna sell folks out by linking to that one here, but I promise that this is currently occurring).
The official selection date for American nominations for “Period 4 [sic] – CAN, USA” is “TBD,” per U.S. Ski & Snowboard, but there sure are a lot of athletes making plans on the basis of something that hasn’t yet been officially announced. And that’s even before we get into the fact that team rosters were basically leaked days ago via the updated NNF fan bibs sale.
Put all of those sources of information together, and you get the following: If the American starters for Canmore were announced today, they would, according to the official USSS internal selection list linked above, be as follows:
Canmore distance races
Women
Sydney Palmer-Leger
Jessie Diggins
Sophia Laukli
Rosie Brennan
Julia Kern
Margie Freed
Alex Lawson
Alayna Sonnesyn
Erin Bianco
Mariah Bredal
Lauren Jortberg
Emma Albrecht
Men
Michael Earnhart
Ben Ogden
Gus Schumacher
Scott Patterson
Zanden McMullen
Luke Jager
Peter Wolter
Hunter Wonders
David Norris
Reid Goble
Braden Becker
Graham Houtsma
Canmore sprint races
Women
Sydney Palmer-Leger
Jessie Diggins
Rosie Brennan
Julia Kern
Alayna Sonnesyn
Renae Anderson
Erin Bianco
Margie Freed
Michaela Keller-Miller
Lauren Jortberg
Alex Lawson
Emma Albrecht
Men
Michael Earnhart
Ben Ogden
JC Schoonmaker
Gus Schumacher
Kevin Bolger
Zak Ketterson
Zanden McMullen
Luke Jager
Logan Diekmann
Will Koch
Murphy Kimball
Jack Young
Notably, this is the list of athletes qualified for these races, *and* planning on attending. Within the first category listed above, for example, female distance skiers in Canmore, there are a full seven athletes who qualified for starts on the basis of their performance in domestic or World Cup races, but who turned down these starts in favor of racing in Planica. (If you’re curious: Novie McCabe, Sammy Smith, Haley Brewster, Kendall Kramer, Nina Schamberger, Ava Thurston, and Nina Seemann.)
I mention this fact in no way to denigrate the accomplishments of the women who were chosen; they are line to start these races, so, scoreboard. I just want to clarify that this is not strictly the 12 highest-ranking athletes on each list. The objective criteria account for the possibility that athletes who would otherwise accept these spots would race elsewhere, and based on my independent analysis they appear to have been accurately followed.
Every athlete listed in this article, on my reading, was chosen via the application of objective criteria, as opposed to via coaches’ discretion.
I can also tell you who is currently in line to start in Minneapolis five days after races wrap up in Canmore, but there is a significant caveat here: Up to two of the twelve spots that the U.S. gets for each race in Minneapolis (i.e., twelve per gender per race) will potentially go to athletes who finish in the top-six in an individual event in Planica.
*If,* for example, an American U23 man makes the sprint final at World U23 Championships on February 6, and an American U20 man makes the sprint final at World Junior Championships on February 5, *and* neither athlete had otherwise qualified for the sprint in Wirth on the basis of the internal USSS selection list, then they would get starts there, and the two currently lowest-ranked starters, Will Koch and Murphy Kimball, would be bumped off the bottom of the start list as a result.
(The above is a true statement for the list as currently written because both Koch and Kimball, in this example, have qualified via the internal USSS selection list, and top-six finishes in Planica outrank this for purposes of selection. The implications of top-six finishes in Planica on current starters would be different if all 12 positions had already been filled via SuperTour leader, coaches’ discretion, and World Cup performances, all of which outrank Planica results when it comes to selection. I mention this to show my work, but that said, that is not the case here.)
With all that said, and keeping in mind that the final names on all the Minneapolis lists are potentially subject to change depending on American results in Planica, here’s who is currently in line to start in the Loppet Cup:
Minneapolis distance race
Women
Sydney Palmer-Leger
Jessie Diggins
Sophia Laukli
Rosie Brennan
Julia Kern
Novie McCabe
Sammy Smith
Margie Freed
Haley Brewster
Kendall Kramer
Nina Schamberger
Alex Lawson
Men
Michael Earnhart
Ben Ogden
Gus Schumacher
John Steel Hagenbuch
Scott Patterson
Zanden McMullen
Luke Jager
Peter Wolter
Hunter Wonders
David Norris
Brian Bushey
Reid Goble
Minneapolis sprint race
Women
Sydney Palmer-Leger
Jessie Diggins
Rosie Brennan
Julia Kern
Sammy Smith
Haley Brewster
Alayna Sonnesyn
Renae Anderson
Erin Bianco
Margie Freed
Ava Thurston
Nina Schamberger
Men
Michael Earnhart
Ben Ogden
JC Schoonmaker
Gus Schumacher
Kevin Bolger
Zak Ketterson
Zanden McMullen
Luke Jager
Logan Diekmann
Walker Hall
Will Koch
Murphy Kimball
I will run a formal team announcement from USSS once one is received. Until then, you may wish to spend your time perusing the face bibs for sale through NNF, which are very nearly coterminous with the athlete names mentioned here. 🤔
Update, January 30: Still no formal announcement from USSS. BSF recently shared the following Instagram post about four athletes starting from their team. Their associated blog post confirms what is written above in this article re: BSF athletes.
Update, January 31: Still no formal announcement from USSS. Craftsbury recently shared the following Instagram post about four athletes starting from their team.
Update, January 31: Still no formal announcement from USSS. Colby College recently shared the following Instagram post about one athlete starting from their team, along with a press release also mentioning recent grad Erin Bianco as a starter.
Update, January 31: Still no formal announcement from USSS. Alayna Sonnesyn of SMS recently shared this post about the races she will be starting.
Update, February 2: The formal announcement from USSS mirrors what was initially reported here.
— Gavin Kentch
