January 15, 2010 (Barrie, ON) – The 2010 edition of the Tour de Ski is now in the books. In my opinion it was the best ever. From the Prologue to the final hill climb this series of races is now getting closer and closer to resembling what it’s modeled after – a cycling tour.

The Prologue set the stage for the sprinters early in the stages and they dominated the first week of the Tour. They were gone after stage 4 and then it was time for the distance skiers to take over. I know, Petter Northug (NOR) was there for both the sprints and the distance stages, but he’s special, isn’t he?

The point-to-point race that ended in Dobbiaco was a great addition to the Tour and there should be more of this. What great images of the skiers going through the tunnels. This was truly a Tour stage.

The best race of the Tour continues to be the hill climb on the last stage. Watching both the men and women climb up Cermis was great. To see the best in the world having to diagonal skate up the hill should make all of us feel a little better. Anyone who skates knows the feeling of not being able to glide anymore uphill and having to walk. Of course, the difference for them was that the hill was 900 ft high with grades up to 20% – and it was the 8th race in 10 days!

Normally I would say that if a skier falls down after the finish line it is posturing. It is someone saying “look at me – look how hard I pushed!” The only reason most of the skiers fall down at the end of a race is because they can. Try that after a road running race or a cycling race. Snow is soft and asphalt hurts. I normally say to myself when I see this “suck it up and stay on your feet you woosy”.

However, I will cut the skiers a little slack at the end of the hill climb stage. It was carnage at the end of the men’s race. Lukas Bauer (CZE) did not have to push to the finish so he stayed on his feet, but the next three guys hit the snow right after they crossed the line and did not get up for a long time. Northug tried once to get up after a minute or so, but sunk back down to the snow. Dario Cologna (SUI) made it a little farther before crashing but Marcus Hellner barely made it over the finish line before he was spread-eagle on his face in the snow for 5 minutes without moving.

So what’s with Bauer on the last two stages in Val di Fiemme? Boy, he really got fast in a hurry. After being 60th on the World Cup rankings before Xmas and a non-factor in the first 6 stages all of a sudden he wins both of the last two stages by over a minute. Every other stage up to then was won in a sprint. For me this is one of those situations that makes you go hmmmm… how does someone get so fast so quickly after being so slow for so long?

And then after the last stage he just had to rub it in to the other guys after the finish. He had to strut around with his country’s flag on his skis and “congratulate” everyone when they fell across the finish line. Northug can also be a cocky guy but to me it seemed that Bauer was perhaps just trying to show everyone how good he was. “Look at me – I just kicked your butt up this hill and look how fresh I am compared to how tired you are feeling”. If I was Northug I’d be putting Bauer’s picture up in my room so that I could look at it every day and plot my revenge. Northug already has Alexander Legkov’s picture on the wall of his bedroom for motivation so putting up Bauer’s picture now won’t hurt.

Next year the Tour de Ski won’t have to compete with the Olympics for the best skiers so the Tour should be even better. I know that the Cross Country Committee at FIS is looking at creating even more Tour-like events on the schedule instead of racing on weekends. This is a positive step forward. It’s also an attempt to stop specialization. If there are more FIS points available when you finish every race then the sprinters will do more distance races and the distance racers will do more sprints. The races that are planned for Canada next winter will follow this format so North Americans will be able to see how it works first hand.