November 23, 2013 (Beitostølen, Norway) – American Liz Stephen delivered a strong top-10 performance on Saturday in the women’s 10km FR individual start on day two in Beitostølen, Norway as Therese Johaug (NOR) breezed to her second straight victory with a comfortable 20s -lead over her teammate Marit Bjoergen. It was a Norwegian sweep on home turf as Astrid Uhrenholdt Jacobsen claimed 3rd. Holly Brooks (USA) came in a solid 12th.

Ida Sargent (l) cheering on Liz Stephen © file photo

“This course is pretty cool for individual starts as well because there are so many sections where it goes back on itself.  Yesterday I had Kikkan starting right behind me and today I had Vibeka right behind, so I used them a bit to help motivate me to keep pushing,” Stephen told Trax.

“I tried to pace it yesterday and it didn’t end up helping me ski fast, so today the goal was to just go out hard and ski well and see what happened. It’s good to have started the season and to have one good race in the bag. I’m excited to head to Kuusamo and into the season and hopefully continue to build through February.

“I race best when I am happy and having so many friends on the team now makes me really happy. It is so nice to have so many more friends and people to help push me, and hopefully people I can help push to their best as well. We are actually about to have them over for our second team get-together of the week for some banana bread before heading out for afternoon training. It is really cool how our two teams have really gotten to know each other. It makes the World Cup and being so far from home for so long so much more enjoyable and manageable,” added the East Montpelier, VT skier.

The other US women in Beitostølen this weekend took a break today and will be on the start line for the skate sprint on Sunday. “Three races was too many with three coming up next weekend in Kuusamo,” said Randall. “This weekend is just a warmup. I am doing the sprint tomorrow.”

Results

1. Therese Johaug (NOR) 24:13.7
2. Marit Bjoergen (NOR) 24:32.6
3. Astrid Uhrenholdt Jacobsen (NOR) 25:00.8
4. Kristin Stoermer Steira (NOR)  25:14.8
5. Vibeke W Skofterud (NOR) 25:18.0
6. Liz Stephen (USA) 25:22.9
12. Holly Brooks (USA) 25:56.7

Full results here.