December 13, 2015 (Davos, Switzerland) – The USA’s Sophie Caldwell was the top North American in sixth in the 1.6km freestyle sprint at the FIS Cross Country World Cup Sunday in Davos, Switzerland. Four American women qualified out of five including Caldwell, Jessie Diggins, Sadie Bjornsen  and Ida Sargent. Canada’s Heidi Widmer, who is racing for Switzerland this year, also made the heats.

Sweden’s Stina Nilsson displayed some tactical moves in the final stretch of the sprint to secure a 0.15 second win over Norway’s Maiken Falla, second, and Ingvlid Oestberg, third.

In the quarterfinal heats, Bjornsen, Sargent and Widmer did not advance, but Diggins won her heat and Caldwell made the semi finals as a Lucky Loser. Diggins and Caldwell went head to head in the second semi final here where once again, Caldwell advanced as the lucky loser to move onto the finals, Diggins was fifth just behind Caldwell.

“Today was a good day for USA! We qualified four girls in the top 20 and ended up with two in the top 10. I really like this course because a lot of it is about riding your ski well across the flats and it has a couple of technical corners. Between the lung burn and the leg burn, the altitude can really take a toll on you. I was very happy with my qualifier.

“That might be the best I’ve ever qualified in a sprint before. I chose the first heat which ended up being really stacked. This makes it difficult to be in the top two, but you can also count on having a fast heat, so I was psyched to place third and move on to the semis as lucky loser.

“I was also the lucky loser in my semi final, so I think I was the luckiest loser of the day! After my semi I was really struggling with the lactic acid I had built up and felt okay for the first lap of my final, but didn’t have anything left in the tank for the second lap. That said, I was really happy with the day.

“I was excited to compete in the first skate sprint of the season and to be in the final exceeded my goals and expectations for the weekend. It’s a good boost of confidence and I’m looking forward to the sprints in the next few weeks. Our service team did an incredible job with skis and it meant so much to me to have all my teammates out there cheering,” said Caldwell.

We caught up with Bjornsen as well. “Another day of ski racing with some goods and some bads. In the six times I have raced here, it is only my second time to qualify, so that was the first good! It never really feels good qualifying here for whatever reason, so I was pleased that I had made it in safely.

“The heats had some really great moments, and some really frustrating moments. I felt like I was having a great heat despite a few bumps, and was coming into the final corner in a good place to gun it for the finish… but I skidded around the final turn loosing all my speed and finding myself on sitting back on the back of my skis struggling to find my strong balance again. So, I know I can do better, but it is a step in a positive direction on the first skate sprint of the year, and somewhere I have previously struggled at. It was really fun to see some awesome skiing by the others on  the team! Go SOPHIA,” she commented.

Women’s results here.

Men’s Sprint

In the men’s 1.6km freestyle sprint, defending Davos sprint champion Federico Pellegrino of Italy snatched first from France’s Baptiste Gros and Noway’s Sondre Fossli in the final stretch of the race. Pellegrino finished 0.27 seconds ahead of Gros, and 0.32 ahead of Fossli.

The U.S. men qualified two out of three skiers. Simi Hamilton qualified 10th and Andy Newell qualified 21st, which advanced them to the quarterfinal heats. Newell fought for third in his heat but was unable to hold on and finished fifth. Hamilton broke a pole in his heat and was unable to recover, finishing fifth as well. Newell finished 23rd overall and Hamilton finished 26th overall.

The Canadians were shut out of qualifying for the heats but 27-year-old Torontonian, Len Valjas, in 31st stresses there is no need to panic. “I skied well enough to move on. I was actually surprised I got knocked out,” said Valjas. “I was only .04 from moving on. There is no reason for people to panic. I felt great, I skied great. It is just unfortunate because I was that close to getting more World Cup points.”

The USA’s Newell wrote, “I’m feeling ok but not great. I don’t think I’ve had the smoothest transition to altitude this time around so I’ve been feeling a little tired the last few days. this Davos medium altitude can be deceiving.. it’s only 5,000 feel but can make you feel wiped sometimes.

“So in qualification I felt ok. this is one of the shortest sprints of the season and times are always tight so as ling as I can be close it’s fine. My quarter final was a super fast heat and I was in a good portion but didn’t have a great corner coming into our second lap and got caught fighting on the outside. By the time we got to the hill it was tough to get past anybody and by that time my legs were pretty worked.

“In general it wasn’t a great day, wasn’t feeling like the sprinter I know I can be this season. the good news is we have another week to adjust to the altitude and I think Toblach  will go a lot better,” he added.

For Hamilton breaking a pole made for a frustrating day. “Yeah, it was a bit of a frustrating day out there. My body felt great and I always love sprinting at altitude. I’ve had some good races here in the past, so I had confidence going into the day, especially since I feel like my fitness is really good this year and I haven’t really gotten much of a chance to showcase that in my sprinting yet.

“I was happy with my qualifier. I just focused on efficient technique with lots of gliding, which I feel is pretty crucial on this course. The conditions suited me really well. It was fast and firm snow, which I generally do well in. In my quarter I had a small tangle at the start which put me towards the back of the pack a little bit, but I just focused on skiing really hard over the first climb so that I could jockey for a better position leading into the second lap.

“I took the fast corner before the transit into the lap lane really wide and kept my momentum well all the way around it, moving even with the top two in my heat at that point. It’s a very narrow lane that you have to squeeze into when you’re making the lap because it has to accommodate the finish lanes and the start lanes, and I just got pinched on the far right side in order to make the turn. As I planted my pole, it just got kicked and snapped up high. I only had to ski for about 150 meters before Grover handed me a spare, but by that point I was pretty far off the pack and couldn’t make up the ground in the short time before the finish stretch.

“But it leaves me hungry for more and I’m really excited that we have another skate sprint coming up on Saturday in Toblach, Italy. I really like that course and I’m fired up to be able to skate sprint again before the Christmas break and the Tour de Ski.

“I think all and all we had a good day as a team out there. It wasn’t stellar, but we put 6 into the points and it was awesome watching Soph fight her way through to the final. We know that we’re capable of a lot more, but there’s plenty more racing in the season and we’re a patient team, so we’re psyched for more to come,” he concluded.

Valjas believes that fractions of a second could have been made up in many sections on the 1.6-kilometre track, but it was a tight corner midway through the course that he believes was the difference. He leveraged a berm that was building on the corner to slingshot him during training. However, when doing his qualifier race officials raked the corner out which threw Valjas out of the top-30.

“I could see coming into the corner that it was different and it shot me out pretty wide,” said Valjas. I likely should have come into the corner slower, but that is part of racing. We have another shot next week and I know we will be better as a team.”

“The field is so deep right now. There is just no margin for error. The learning is I need to ski more aggressive now in the qualifiers. You just can’t take any chances or anything for granted anymore. Even if I think I had a great qualifier, when I’m coming down the finishing stretch I have to throw down everything I have, and lunge across the line because you just never know,” he added.

Alex Harvey placed 54th, Jesse Cockney was 62nd, American Erik Bjornsen was 68th and Michael Somppi (Can) placed 85th. The World Cup now travels to Toblach, Italy for the final series of races before the holiday break.

Men’s results here.