December 28, 2007 – You know you’ve made it when your face appears in the New York Times, one of the most prestigious publications world wide. Alaska’s Kikkan Randall received that honour today as a feature story along with a photo of Randall winning her first World Cup XC Sprint race earlier this month appeared in today’s NY Times. On December 16, 2007 in Rybinsk, Russia, Randall became the first American woman to win a cross-country World Cup and the first American to win a World Cup cross-country event since Bill Koch in 1983.

Pursuing a Cross-Country Dream
by Jack Bell/NY Times

For elite American cross-country skiers, winter trails have always seemed to stretch to a horizon that was seldom attained.

Kikkan Randall, a two-time Olympian who turns 25 on Monday, took a snow-covered expressway and became the first American woman to win a cross-country event in World Cup competition.

On Dec. 16 in Rybinsk, Russia, Randall outsprinted some of the best female cross-country skiers in the world to win the 1.2-kilometer freestyle sprint race in a photo finish over the sprint world champion Astrid Jacobsen of Norway.

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.

No American woman has ever won an Olympic medal in cross-country skiing. Koch, who is credited with developing a new cross-country technique that evolved into the skating style, won a silver medal in the 30K race at the 1976 Olympics in Innsbruck, Austria.

Read the complete article here…