By Gavin Kentch
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Here we go again. Welcome back to the first viewing guide of the fourth year of Nordic Insights. When I first started doing this, Hailey Swirbul was still racing. Now Hailey Swirbul is still racing. Time marches on.
I will run a version of this guide throughout the season in advance of each race weekend. Just the World Cup for now, but I will add in the SuperTour once that comes online.
For now, though, the World Cup is the only game in town. (With all respect to Friday’s 62nd annual Turkey Day Relays in Fairbanks. This is legit impressive considering that Alaska has only been a state for 66 years now; this would be like a ski race in Vermont dating back to 1795. Fairbanks, which is already onto its third race weekend of the winter, does not mess around.)
Last November I wrote in these pages, “For now the only thing on tap is the Ruka Triple, the opening three-race series of the World Cup season for roughly the last decade now. It is dark and cold at 66° N latitude, and the sun will set in Ruka tomorrow at 1:55 p.m., and Zanden McMullen says that the Ruka course ‘is just Mount Everest up every hill.’”
The days map out a little differently this season, so this year the sun will set in Ruka tomorrow at the hedonistic hour of 2:02 p.m. Enjoy those seven extra minutes of afternoon “daylight,” folks. Skiing is fun.
Anyway. Here is when the races will be this weekend.
World Cup (local time at venue: GMT +2. This is 7 hours ahead of the East Coast and 11 hours ahead of Alaska.)
| date | race | time (AK) | time (EST) | results |
| Friday, Nov. 28 | W 10km classic | 12:30 a.m. | 4:30 a.m. | here |
| M 10km classic | 3:15 a.m. | 7:15 a.m. | here | |
| Saturday, Nov. 29 | classic sprint qual | 10:55 p.m. Fri. | 2:55 a.m. | here |
| classic sprint heats | 1:25 a.m. Sat. | 5:25 a.m. | here | |
| Sunday, Nov. 30 | M 20km skate mass start | 12 a.m. | 4 a.m. | here |
| W 20km skate mass start | 1:45 a.m. | 5:45 a.m. | here |
Who will be racing for the U.S.?
Good question. American starters in the 10km classic are, in bib-number order, Kate Oldham, Kendall Kramer, Rosie Brennan, Julia Kern, Jessie Diggins, Sophia Laukli, and Alayna Sonnesyn for the women, and Luke Jager, John Steel Hagenbuch, Zanden McMullen, Ben Ogden, Gus Schumacher, JC Schoonmaker, and Zak Ketterson, for the men. It is a seasoned group; no one in the preceding sentence is making their World Cup debut here (without pulling all the numbers, I’m sure that Oldham has the fewest starts of anyone listed here, with Kramer next).
Expect probably the same slate of starters in Sunday’s 20km skate, and… only the addition of a sprinter or two for Saturday. With relatively minimal changes, this is pretty much your American World Cup crew on the ground in Europe between now and Davos. Starters have been named for Period 1, but not for after that.
“You have to keep making the different periods” of racing throughout the World Cup season, Kramer told adopted-hometown paper the Anchorage Daily News in a recent profile of her and (many) other Alaskans racing in Europe this winter. “And so you can’t say if you’re on the team for the year, like you are in college. You can’t really draw out your season as much. And that’s cool, it keeps me on my toes.”
When can you read an article about this race on this fine website?
Another good question. We are moving to an afternoon-paper model this year, so that I can go skiing in the scant Alaska daylight and not get stuck inside all day waiting for articles, then go out only in the (admittedly lengthy) gloaming and get depressed. Skiing should make people happy, not sad.
So: Wake up, skim the results to see who won, read FIS’s writeup of the day here, and then go for a ski or play with your kids or what have you. Check back here later — much later, candidly, if you live on the East Coast — to see what the athletes had to say about their day. I promise that our… insights will be worth the wait.
You’re reading this on Nordic Insights, one man’s labor of love dedicated to publicizing American skiing. We started with nothing and now we’re going to the Olympics. You can read more about our first three years here, and donate to the Olympics fund here. Thank you for consideration, and, especially, for reading.
