February 06, 2015 (Almaty, Kazakhstan) – The FIS Junior Nordic World Championships continued in Almaty, Kazakhstan with the Skiathlon races where Team USA skiers had super performances, led by Katharine Ogden (USA) and Ian Torchia (USA), who finished 6th and 11th in the men’s and women’s events, respectively.

Katharine Ogden (USA) ©USSA

“It was a great day for us today,” said Team USA Head Coach Bryan Fish. “Both Katharine and Ian did an excellent job avoiding crashes at the start. Unfortunately, two of our men weren’t so lucky. Evan Weinman had a damaged classic ski and Tom Bye broke a pole.”

A technical course and fast snow conditions resulted in lots of crashes at the start, but Sofie Nordsveen Hustad (NOR) stayed out of trouble to win gold in the women’s 5km CL/5km FR race in a time of 27:02.08. Ogden was only 13.2s off the leader.

Katharine Ogden (USA) avoids crash ©USSA

“Katharine [Ogden] skied in the lead chase pack after Victoria Carl from Germany broke away and had a 12-second lead during the first lap of the skate,” said Fish. “There was a great deal of movement in the pack. Katharine would charge on the climbs, leading the pack uphill and the Russians would immediately react over the climbs and pull in front. It was a hard fought battle on a challenging 2.5km skate course.”

A happy Women's team (l-r) Annah Hanthorn, Katherine Stewart-Jones, Anne-Marie Comeau and Maya McIssac-Jones ©CCC

“This result was really great for me and I am psyched to be able to mix it up with some fast Juniors,” said Ogden. “My race was actually pretty uneventful, I mainly worked to maintain my position in the pack and not break any equipment for the first part and than gradually people began dropping off leaving eventually about 6 or 7 of us pretty close together at the end of the second skate lap.”

Katharine Ogden (USA) ©USSA

Other North American results include Canada’s Katherine Stewart-Jones (CAN) in 14th, Anne-Marie Comeau (CAN) 25th, Hailey Swirbul (USA) 35th, Julia Kern (USA) 38th, Maya MacIsaac-Jones (CAN) 45th, Annah Hanthorn (CAN) 47th, and Alayna Sonnesyn (USA) 50th.

“It feels amazing to have achieved my goal of finishing top 15 in a distance race at worlds,” said Stewart-Jones. Today was my last chance to reach that goal so I am definitely super excited about my race! I am really happy about being consistent in all three races; to me being a specialist closes doors that haven’t even been opened yet. I want to be able to compete in any of the possible events that are held on the world cup circuit.”

Ian Torchia (USA) ©USSA

Alexey Chervotkin (RUS) won the 10km CL/10km FR junior men’s competition in 48:53.3 with top North American Torchia 2:15.0 off the pace. The top Canadian result came from Alexis Dumas (CAN) in a solid 18th.

“My race went really well. I’m super happy with the result, I knew that if I was in good shape and the skis were good I could make the top 20,” said Dumas. “The condition were warm around +3C and the snow was pretty dirty. However, the wax techs gave me super skis in classic and also in skate. Everything came togheter today and I’m super happy.”

Alexis Dumas after the race ©CCC

Ricardo Izquierdo-Bernier (CAN) was 41st, Phillipe Boucher (CAN) 53rd, Evan Weinman (USA) 57th, Zachary Christofanilli (CAN) 60th and Thomas Bye (USA) 67th.

“Ian [Torchia] had to navigate from bib 60 through the field. It was impressive watching Ian moving rapidly in the classic portion and his transition was one of the fastest all day. He skied aggressively through the field spending a great deal of time outside of the tracks. He was aggressive on the downhills and transitions and fortunately, we had great gliding skis,” said Fish.

Alexis Dumas (CAN) 18th Skiathlon ©CCC

“It is all smiles on our team. We have a very positive vibe right now. The momentum is in our favor and we are looking forward to carrying it into tomorrow’s U23 races,” he added.

Results

Women here
Men here