World Cup in Norway – McKinstry, Taylor, Visnick and coach Ty Upson represent the USA
World Cup Finals – Geilo, Norway
Thursday, March 7, Parallel Sprint
Results from today’s final race in Geilo: Visnick: 25th, McKinstry: 13th, and Taylor 14th. Athletes move on to
Spain (where several other US racers will join them) for the World Championships! Racers taking home crystal globes today are: 1)Sigrid Rykhus, 2)Amelie Reymond, 3) Lisa Englund and 1) Mattias Wagenius, 2) Phil Lau, 3) Tobias Mueller.
Complete ResultsWednesday, March 6, Classic
Today’s results for the USA from Geilo: Tanner Visnick: 24th, Zoë Taylor 14th and Madi McKinstry 12th.
Women’s Podium: 1 Amelie Reymond (SUI), 2 Sigrid Rykhus (NOR), 3 Lisa Englund (SWE) With one more race tomorrow to determine the Women’s WC Overall this season, Sigrid Rykhus leads Amelie Reymond by 120 points, so it looks like Sigrid has made her comeback this season.
Men’s Podium: 1 Tobias Mueller (GER), Mattias Wagenius (SWE), Jonas Schmid (GER). Phil Lau leads Mattias Wagenius by only 32 points. Anything can happen in the Parallel Sprint tomorrow!
Tuesday, March 5 – Sprint Classic
Tough day today at the first races in Geilo of the World Cup finals. Zoë and Madi had nice first races and were 12th and 11th, respectively. People were slipping and sliding out on the tough course, so a relatively clean run was something to be proud of. Tanner made the bib-flip at position 30 after the first run and an even slicker course by the time he ran. Sadly, there was even more carnage in the second run and Zoë was one of the victims, taking out first a panel of a gate and then falling through the panel of a second after a very nice top part of the course. She was not able to finish. Madi survived and ended up in 9th place after at least one of the top 10 women also didn’t finish. One Norwegian man punctured a lung and had to be airlifted out. Tomorrow is the Classic.
Women’s Results Men’s Results
World Cup – Rjukan, Norway
Saturday, March 2 – Team Parallel
In the world’s first Team Parallel competition, Team USA gave the Swiss a run for their money in the first round of competition. Madi McKinstry put the team ahead 2-1 by beating her opponent in the first run. Tanner Visnick won his match too. However, Zoë Taylor was paired against a Swiss man and though she wore her “man pants” she was defeated. Team USA lost 2-1 in the first round. Norway, France, Germany and Switzerland move on to the semi-finals.
Congrats to Zoë Taylor, Madi McKinstry, and Tanner Visnick for their team performance!
Complete Results
Thursday/Friday, February 28/March 1 – Parallel Sprint
World Cup in Rjukan this week is all about the Parallel Sprint races. Thursday and Friday were both individual Parallel Sprints, with qualifiying rounds the day before. From the US, Madi McKinstry was the only racer to make the final rounds of Parallel, head-to-head racing. Tomorrow is the first running of a new, Team Parallel Sprint. Three racers comprise a team, usually 2 men and a women. The organizers and TD have made an exception for the USA and we will have 2 women and one man compete because that is what we have in Rjukan for this event. Following is Madi’s report about the last couple of days.
Norge Update from Madi
Today was the second parallel, and I raced Amelie. Last night we had a “qualifier” but really it was just the round of 16, so we went off sprint points, pairing me (7th) against Zoe (10th) that round, and moving me on to the round of 8 against Amelie (2nd). So just like last year…she whooped me! I knew it was not going to be a fight, and didn’t really ski to put up a fight. She had a bobble on the bottom of the first run after the jump, which allowed me to get within a ski length or more of her, but then we hit the rap and well…it was all over. But yesterday I raced Mathilde and kept pretty well up with her until about the end of the loom, then she blasted through the skate. I also qualified 6th on Wednesday to get paired with Mathilde, and out of 14 girls, that’s pretty exciting. Tomorrow is the team event and we will be racing team Switzerland, Zoe will race Amelie, and either Tanner or I will race Bastien or Nicolas Michel. So yes, I will be racing a guy, better put my man pants on? I think it will be really fun though, and hopefully I will ski my best, nothing to lose, right?!
Today’s Results:
1. Phil Lau
2. Tobi Muller
3. Mattias Wagenius
1. Sigrid Rykhus
2. Amelie Reymond
3. Lisa Englund
