On Dec. 16 in Rybinsk, Russia, Kikkan Randall became the first American woman to win a cross-country event in a World Cup competition.
The victory made Randall, who was born in Salt Lake City and grew up in Anchorage, the first American to win a World Cup cross-country event since Bill Koch in 1983.
Randall outsprinted some of the best female cross-country skiers in the world to win the 1.2km freestyle sprint race, finishing ahead of the sprint world champion Astrid Jacobsen of Norway.
No American woman has ever won an Olympic medal in cross-country skiing. Koch won a silver medal in the 30K race at the 1976 Olympics in Innsbruck, Austria.
"First and foremost this sport is about fitness," Luke Bodensteiner, the US ski team's Nordic director, said. "These athletes are among, if they are not, the world's fittest. The Europeans have long had an advantage because they come from a ski culture."
"For us, cross-country skiing has long been a family-oriented, healthy sport where you can get your kids outside in the winter and parents can ski side by side with them," he said.
Randall, a champion cross-country runner in high school in Alaska, embraced skiing as a way to stay in condition and keep her competitive fire stoked during the long and dark winter days in the Far North.
At 19, she made her Olympic debut in the 2002 Games in Salt Lake City, finishing 44th in the first Olympic sprint.
Last year in Turin, Randall finished ninth in the sprint, the best Olympic result in cross-country skiing by an American woman.
"Being at the Games in Salt Lake really planted the seed for me," Randall said. "Then I felt strong in Turin.
"In Russia, I only wanted to ski my race, but then I was neck and neck with Astrid as we approached the only uphill climb. I passed her and was kind of waiting for her to come back at me, but she never did," he said.
Randall will join other members of the US team in Houghton, Michigan, for the national championships, with competition beginning on Tuesday.
"It's kind of a low-key event for an athlete of Kikkan's caliber," Bodensteiner said. "The World Cup is really where it's at."
For the first time in almost 36 years, a Parisian derby will be played in French soccer’s top flight when reigning champions Paris Saint-Germain FC take on the nouveau riche Paris Football Club (PFC) today. Not one of the players involved in today’s match — PFC’s 38-year-old third-choice goalkeeper Remy Riou is almost certainly not going to be involved — was born the last time there was a Parisian derby in Ligue 1. That was on Feb. 25, 1990, when Moroccan midfielder Aziz Bouderbala scored a brace as Racing Paris 1 beat PSG 2-1 at the Parc des Princes home that
BOUNCING BACK: Antetokounmpo had just returned from an eight-game injury absence last month, leading the Milwaukee Bucks to their third win in four games Giannis Antetokounmpo threw down the game-winning dunk with 4.7 seconds remaining to lift the Milwaukee Bucks to a 122-121 victory over the Charlotte Hornets and grab a slice of NBA history on Friday. The Bucks trailed by as many as 16 on their home floor, but Antetokounmpo scored 12 of his 30 points in the final quarter to help seal the win in a frantic finish that saw five lead changes in the final 45.7 seconds. The two-time NBA Most Valuable Player (MVP) added 10 rebounds and five assists. It was his 158th regular-season game with at least 30 points, 10 rebounds and
Stan Wawrinka’s 40-year-old legs did not let him down over three-plus hours in his first singles match of a farewell tour yesterday. Three-time Grand Slam singles champion Wawrinka beat Arthur Rinderknech of France, who is ranked 29th to Wawrinka’s 157th, 5-7, 7-6 (5), 7-6 (5). The match went 3 hours, 16 minutes. Wawrinka last month announced that this year would be his last on the ATP tour. “Today was a tough battle ... it’s amazing to come here for the first time, to have so much support,” Wawrinka said yesterday. “Twenty years on tour, you kind of always play in the same place
Four-time Grand Slam champion Naomi Osaka yesterday got her season off to a winning start for Japan in the United Cup, after the UK’s Emma Raducanu pulled out of their singles clash with a fitness issue, while in Brisbane, Taiwan’s Latisha Chan and Wu Fang-hsien crashed out of the women’s doubles. In Perth, despite Osaka’s win, the UK took the match 2-1 with a deciding mixed doubles victory. Osaka was too strong for reserve and 276th-ranked Katie Swan, winning 7-6 (7/4), 6-1 as Raducanu watched from the sidelines. “I’m proud of how I fought,” Osaka said. “I’d never played here, it was tough.” Britain
RSS