By The Diggins Collapse Index
The following piece was recently received from The Diggins Collapse Index. You can follow The Index on Instagram here. You can find out more about The Index’s backstory here. The Index would probably also like you to buy its stickers, which you may do here (The Index did not tell me to say that).
You should watch slide two of the following embed before reading.
It may come as a surprise that The Index is a fan of other endurance sports, but we must do something in the offseason. As a result, The Index knows that the first day of Le Tour de France is called The Grand Depart. Well, the final of the men’s sprint in Lahti saw The Grond Depart the snow far before the finish line.
Undoubtedly your less-educated readers will suspect that Grond crashed, rather than collapsed. The Index is here to dispel this uncritical analysis. Let’s go to the tape.
Grond, who has ZERO Index points all season, is losing speed coming down the finish straight. He realizes that a podium (in the ski race, not the only race that matters) may be out of reach. He makes the shrewd decision to Depart (see, we did it again) his line and drift to the right. Why? Because a fast-charging Pellegrino is coming. This serves two purposes.
1. If Grond can sufficiently disrupt Pellegrino, he can solidify his third place in the meaningless sprint race.
2. If Grond can’t beat Pellegrino, he can score the first pre-finish collapse of the season and actually score a substantial volume of Index points.
Grond can’t beat Pellegrino, but he tangles himself in Pellegrino’s left ski, which causes Grond to “fall” hard onto his chest. We get a nice roll with skis up in the air. Grond is stricken with agony and Doris, the FIS social media person, comes over with her silly white boots to help him. She removes his pole straps. Pellegrino, in recognition for Grond’s strategic mastery, comes over to remove his skis. That’s two help points. Grond remains on the ground making pain faces for 75 seconds.
2 Help + 1.25 Duration + 7 Drama (for the entire masterpiece) gives Grond a 10.25, the second-highest score of the year.
Some athletes have already ended their season. Frida Karlsson, for example, did fewer races than the average BKL skier. Others are taking the final World Cup period as a chance to come in hot to next season. Julia Kern comes to mind with “The Fallin in Tallinn” as they call it. Valerio Grond took his forgettable season which, until this, was devoid of any quality results, and flipped it 180 degrees… just like his body on the snow across the line.
