Canmore World Cup Sprint Freestyle

Esther Bottomley took 43rd place in the Sprint Freestyle World Cup in Canmore today, 10.1 seconds behind the fastest qualifier Kuitunen from Finland. It was Bottomley's best FIS point race of the season, but about three seconds short of the time she needed in order to qualify for the finals. Paul Murray was 10.9 seconds off the pace in the men's qualification, however with super fast men times under 2 minutes this left Murray towards the back of the field in 68th place. It was a good result for Bottomley, not in the finals where she is aiming to be but still up in the ball park and not too far off. For Murray the result was a reflection of his illness after China and lack of training over the past month. The plan for both athletes now is to get some good training in and build the fitness up again. Murray will return to Sweden tomorrow for two weeks before the World Cup in Estonia. Bottomley will return to Silver Star and train for nearly 6 weeks before the Canadian Championships on the 2010 Olympic tracks at Callaghan Valley. KT Calder heads back to Switzerland in preparation for competitions yet to be determined - possibly some Swiss loppets, maybe an OPA cup if they schedule a new event in the next two weeks, and possibly even a World Cup in Czech.

Swiss Championship Sprint Freestyle

At the Swiss Sprint Championship in Lac Retaud most of the Australians competing got some finals action. Chloe McConville qualified 5th in the open women's event, 9 seconds behind the fastest qualifier and A-final winner Laurien Van der Graaff, then was knocked out in the semi-final and finished 6th. Georgia Merritt was 13th in the U20 junior class and Juliette Booth 12th in the U18 junior class, both being knocked out in the quarter finals. In the open men's class Nick Grimmer and Ben Sim qualified for the finals in 14th and 16th place, 9.8 and 10.7 seconds behind the fastest qualifier Eligius Tambonino. Andrew Mock just missed out in 18th place, two seconds behind Sim, while Ronan Magaharan was further back in 22nd place. Both Grimmer and Sim were knocked out in the quarter finals. Last but not least, Callum Watson qualified 8th in the U20 junior class, 10.7 seconds behind the fastest junior and 1.4 seconds behind Mock. On paper Watson was best positioned to make it through to the next round, but he was tipped out of the quarter finals by the 9th fastest qualifer and so ended up 9th overall. Alex Almoukov, Aimee Watson, and Jaffa Withers didn't race today. Tomorrow there are the Pursuit competitions, with 10+10 for the open men, 5+5 for all the women, and 7.5+7.5 for the junior men.

Courtesy XC Files