December 22, 2013 (Asiago, Italy) – In a rock’em, sock’em showdown Norway’s Ola Vigen Hattestad out-lunged Alexey Poltoranin (KAZ) for the victory in the men’s 6 x 1.65km Team Sprint CL in Asiago, Italy as an appetizer to the event which will be held at the Sochi 2014 Olympic Grames next Feb. Norway 2’s Eirick Brandsdal held off yesterday’s winner Nikita Kriukov (RUS) for the bronze.

(l) Alexey Poltoranin (KAZ) and Ola Vigen Hattestad (NOR) © Nordic Focus

Canada 1, Alex Harvey and Devon Kershaw, former Team Sprint champs and the USA 1’s Andy Newell and Simi Hamilton, despite being close, were shut out of the final leaving both teams with a somewhat disappointing end to the first period of racing.

Eirik Brandsdal (NOR) chases Andy Newell (USA) © Nordic Focus

Organizers salted the course, but with tough warm conditions being the order of the day, it didn’t help their cause being in the second semi final heat which was noticeably slower than the first. Harvey and Kershaw finished 11th on the day and the USA 1 was 12th. Canada 2 with Len Valjas and Jesse Cockney were 24th and USA 2 with Torin Koos and Michael Sinnott were 28th.

Jesse Cockney (CAN) © Nordic Focus

Norway, Russia and Kazakhstan were the main protagonists in the final with Sweden flexing its muscles as well but by the 5th leg six teams had emerged as the front group with Russia 2 and Norway 2 also getting into the mix.

By the final exchange it was Norway’s Hattestad, Kazakhstan’s Poltoranin and Russia 2’s Maxim Vylegzhanin pulling away but a miscue by Vylegzhanin saw Norway 2’s Brandsdal take over 3rd and even challenge for the lead as Kriukov tried in vain following a crash to get back in contention.

By then it was too late as Hattestad and Poltoranin were now in charge with the latter trying not to end up the bridesmaid again as he did yesterday when Kriukov pipped him at the line. But it was deja vue as they streaked down the final straight-away to the finish and the final lunge to the line saw Hattestad emerge as the winner in a photo finish.

Ola Vigen Hattestad (NOR) leads Nikita Kriukov (RUS) © Nordic Focus

We caught up with Hamilton post-race for his take on the day…

“I’m not ecstatic about today’s performance, but I’m coming out of it having learned some valuable lessons and am pretty fired up for more team sprinting in the future (especially in Sochi). With very warm temps again last night, the course broke down a fair amount throughout the day like it did yesterday, although they chose to salt last night which helped to some degree.

“I think that we were at a bit of a disadvantage being in the 2nd semifinal as conditions were seemingly getting slower and slower with every lap skied (also, I don’t think it’s pure coincidence that 5 out of the 6 lucky loser teams came from semifinal #1 for both the women’s race and men’s race). Still I don’t like to cast all the blame on the conditions.

Hattestad (l) and Roenning © Nordic Focus

“I made a huge tactical mistake today by switching to classic skis for my middle leg when I should have just trusted my double pole and gone on skate skis for all three legs. In my opening leg, I felt very controlled and relaxed and had great glide on my skate skis. I thought that by switching to classic skis I would conserve valuable energy for an all out final double pole lap, but I think I ended up expending more energy trying to double pole 90% of the course on my classic skis than I would have if I had just double poled 100% of it on my skate skis.

“Anyway, I guess that’s why they say experience is the best way to learn something… I certainly did today! I have a bit of a sour taste in my mouth knowing that we were so close to advancing to the finals and my stupid decision most likely cost us the few valuable seconds that would have gotten us there, but I’m extremely excited for our next team sprint in Nove Mesto (CZE) in about a month and then of course hopefully racing the brutal Team Sprint in Sochi,” Hamilton told Trax post-race.

Full results here.

Final podium © Nordic Focus