Posts Tagged ‘Norway’

It started at the Winter X games in 1998 but has been introduced as a medal event for the first time at Whistler – hot on the heels of snowboard cross which made its debut at Turin four years ago. But why is this newcomer generating so much attention

Ski Cross, or Ski X as it is often written, is a race on skis between four skiers on a man made course which includes twists, turns and spectacular jumps. The race lasts about a minute and then its all over. But the frequency of crashes draws attention – it is good TV viewing with non stop action.

The video below from WorldSportTV explains what it is all about and features the French champion Ophelie David who will be competing at Whistler, Karin Huttary, a former X Games champion from Austria and Enak Gavaggio of France.

A Ski Cross Course needs to meet requirements specified by the FIS (Fédération Internationale de Ski) rules. There are men’s and women’s events and both use the same course. Athletes will have to race the course many times during the event.

The course is constructed of obstacles such as traverses, flats, rolls, banks, moguls, and jumps of various heights and difficulties, all connected with turns.

• Length: 800 to 1200 m
• Vertical Drop: 150 to 250 m
• Turns: 50% of the course must be turns of varying size and speeds between the other obstacles.
• Features: 25% of the course must be traverses, moguls, banks etc.
• Jumps: 25% of the course will be jumps 1 to 4 m high.

The excitement is immediate as all four racers start at the same time with racers spending as much as 25% of the race airborne whilst travelling at speeds of up to 65 mph and all the time there is the threat of a wipe out which can be your own fault or you may be taken out by your fellow racers.

After a timed qualification round the qualifiers race in knock out heats head to head with the first and second proceeding to the next round. When there are just 8 racers left there is what is termed ‘the small final’ to determine positions 5 to 8 inclusive and there is the ‘big final’ which determines positions 1 to 4 and therefore, in the case of the Olympics, the gold, silver and bronze medals.

Competitors are not allowed to push or trip or commit any foul play and can be disqualified from the competition if this happens.

The men’s final was held on Sunday and the winner was Switzerland’s Michael Schmid ahead of Andreas Matt of Austria who captured silver and Audun Grønvold of Norway won the bronze medal.

The ladies take to the hill today so do not miss any of the action, one of the favourites will be Ophelie David. Here she is winning the world championship held in Madonna di Campiglio in Italy in 2007. Thanks to sportsnetwork for the video and good luck Ophelie!

Don’t miss the action later today.

We have been away for a few days, to the beautiful island of Majorca and had to come back via Zurich where it was snowing. This morning, a beautiful clear day in Provence, we could see the southern Alps covered with snow. The radio told us that resorts like Isola 2000 and Auron had a 40cms of snow at the station and 80 cms at the top. Winter has arrived and many of these resorts will be opening the second week of December.

2010 is of course the year of the Winter Olympics which start in February in Vancouver, Canada. Many extreme sports are practised during the games – snowboarding in its various guises, skiing…..where do we stop, but we suggest that ski jumping must rank as one of the most extreme.

Men’s ski jumping has been part of the Olympic Winter Games since the first Games in Chamonix, in 1924. The large hill competition was added for the Innsbruck 1964 Winter Games.

Above – Todd Loddwick of the United States – photo courtesy AP Photo/Matthias Rietschiel

There are now three medal events at the Olympics – the normal hill individual, the large hill individual and a team event. The format for the individual events is the same: there are 50 starters being the world’s top 15 ranked ski jumpers and 35 who will have qualified at the games. The first round whittles this number down to 35 jumpers who then jump again in reverse starting order to the distance jumped in the first round.

Competitors are evaluated on distance and style and while there is a very close relationship between the two, the skier with the longest jump will often have the highest style points. An exception to this can be found in the landing portion of the jump as long jumps can make landing in a controlled telemark position more difficult. The quality of landing can be a determining factor in deciding the finishing place when the distances are similar.

The team event is comprised of four athletes and there are two rounds of competition. In the first round, one skier from each team jumps. Then, the second skier from each team jumps. Then the third, followed by the fourth.

In the second round, only the top eight teams from the first round compete. Similar to the individual events, the less proficient jumpers go first and the best jumpers go last. The team with the highest total score over all eight jumps wins.

Norway heads the list of all time medal winners at the Winter Olympics, holding a total of 280 medals including 98 golds and in Vancouver it will be Anders Jacobsen who will be trying to take that total of golds to 100.

In the video below from Silosaft you can watch Jocobsen win at Innsbruck in 2007, narrowly beating Thomas Morgenstern of Austria.

Good luck to all competitors – perhaps this is one extreme sport that you could not practise in Majorca!

So who says golf can’t be extreme? If you’ve seen our past 2 articles (and I’d better warn you that there are likely to be more in the pipeline) you, too, might be revising your opinion of golf and golfers… here’s the last 4 of the 8 most extreme golf courses in the world…

Ushuaia Golf Club, Argentina.

This is the world’s sourthernmost golf course and the tmeperatures reflect this. Ushuaia has a maritime subantarctic climate. Temperatures average 1 °C (33 °F) in the coldest month, and 9 °C (48 °F) in the warmest month. The record low is −20 °C (−4 °F) (July), and record high 31 °C (87.8 °F) (December). The record low ever recorded in summer is −6 °C (21 °F) (February). It is a short, difficult and windy 9-holes links course.  From October to April, days are longer and one can play between 6 AM and 10 PM. It is not a championship course. It is different. Created in 1992, the first 9 holes of the Ushuaia Golf Course are located  at the door of the Lapataia National Natural Park nearby the ancient convict train station on the steep hills along a mountain stream, el Rio Pipo. Between snow-topped mountains and the cold waters of the Beagle Channel, the course ambles from the steep slopes, over the small tumultuous river and back up  and down the hill again. There is a touch of the  wild Scottish Highlands here. The holes are short but not straight with narrow fairways, small greens near the stream and the ever-present winds. There is no sophistication, just a lovely natural place with a warm welcome at the club house.

North Cape Golf Club, Norway.

And once again from once extreme to the other – from the southern-most course to the northern-most one…  this course is 280m north of the Arctic Circle. The typical golfing season in Norway ranges from early May until the snow comes (mid/late November). Golfing in many locations is possible twenty four hours a day between the middle of May until the end of July. A golfer’s paradise? or a non-golfer’s nightmare! This is not a challenging golf course, with its 6-hole course, 2 par 4’s and 4 par 3’s and quantities of mud, but it has one lovely oddity – with the Arctic Circle Norwegians having little sense of territory, and obviously a great sense of sportsmanship, if the ball lands in one of the unfenced gardens that border the course, you are allowed to lob it back into play! Although North Cape is on the list of 8 most extreme golf courses, it is now no longer the most northern -most. It has been superceded by Hammerfest Golf Course – also Norway.

Ko’olau Golf Club, Hawaii.

This is reputably the toughest golf course in the world. Carved out of the topical rainforest on the windward side of the 2,000-foot Ko’olau Ridge mountain range, Ko’olau encompasses three distinct climate zones and features winding ravines, extreme elevation changes, and breathtaking views of cascading waterfalls – all on one golf course!. Situated on eastern Oahu, the rugged landscape of this tropical jungle course uses ravines as the target for holes and boasts lush vegetation and huge sand bunkers. The course was built in 1991 as a private Country Club for the high rollers, located just over the Pali Highway from Honolulu.  You can’t beat this golf course for beautz. It has breathtaking mountain views, spectacular fiarwazs surrounded by rainforest, and dramatic sights of the Pacific Ocean. The rule of thumb here is to bring the same number of balls as your handicap. The 18th hole has two carries over a giant ravine – both the drive and the approach shot… you have been warned!

And last, but not least, the world’s oldest and most famous course: Old Course, St. Andrews, Scotland.

If there is a single course in the entire world that most golfers aspire to play just once in their lifetime, it is the Old Course at St Andrews in Scotland – a course like no other and an experience like no other. Golf has been played on the Links at St Andrews since around 1400 AD and the Old Course is renowned throughout the world as the Home of Golf. Golf was clearly becoming popular in the middle ages, as the game was banned in 1457 by King James II of Scotland who felt it was distracting young men from archery practice. This ban was repeated by succeeding monarchs until James IV threw in the towel and in 1502 became a golfer himself. As the 600 year history of the Links has unfolded, one simple track hacked through the bushes and heather has developed into six, and now seven with the new Castle Course open, public golf courses, attracting hundreds of thousands of golfing pilgrims from around the globe. St Andrews Links is the largest golfing complex in Europe and all 18 hole courses can be booked in advance. In 1764 the Old Course consisted of 22 holes, 11 out and 11 back, with golfers playing to the same hole going out and in, except for the 11th and 22nd holes. The golfers decided that the first four holes, and therefore also the last four holes, were too short and that they should be made into two holes instead of four. This reduced the number of holes in the round from 22 to 18, and that is how today’s standard round of golf was created.

Sunday’s United States Open Snowboarding Championships final was somewhat lackluster, with several of the sport’s biggest stars out with injuries. Several contenders for spots on the United States Olympic team next season were absent, including Mason Aguirre, Danny Davis and Kevin Pearce.

But the most conspicuous absence was that of Shaun White, a gold medal winner in the 2006 Olympics in Turin, Italy, and the defending champion in halfpipe and slopestyle at the Open. White pulled out of competition before the halfpipe finals Saturday afternoon with an ankle injury. He injured his left ankle during training last week. A trainer worked with him Saturday morning, but White decided he could not compete. By doing so, White forfeited a chance to win the Ticket to Ride World Snowboard Tour championship.

After competing in the slopestyle finals the women who finished in the top three spots engaged in another competition at the awards ceremony to see who could drink a bottle of Champagne the fastest. Just as on the mountain, Kjersti Oestgaard Buaas won. “My mom would probably be like, Ohhh,” Oestgaard Buaas said, shaking her head. Speed on the course was another matter.

After several days of sun and warm weather, a snow squall blew through the Green Mountains just as the finals began. That led to poor visibility and slowed the slopestyle course so that several riders struggled to gain enough speed to launch over the jumps. “I still had speed for my first run, but no vision,” said Oestgaard Buaas, a 26-year-old from Norway, who won her second consecutive slopestyle title at the United States Open.

Eventually, the skies cleared in time for Oestgaard Buaas, and for Chas Guldemond in the men’s final, to produce winning runs on the 1,800-foot-long course, which consisted of two rails and four jumps.

On her third and final run, Oestgaard Buaas pulled her winning routine, a nosepress to 180 spin off the rail, followed by a 540 spin, a backside 360, a frontside 360, and finished with a frontside 720 — two full rotations — for a score of 92.0. Jenny Jones of Britain finished second with a score of 87.0, and Chanelle Sladics of Newport Beach, Calif., third with a 73.0.

Oestgaard Buaas, who finished fourth in the women’s halfpipe final Saturday, was named the women’s best overall rider.

For Guldemond, of Laconia, N.H., the stormy New England weather was no problem. He put together a winning run on his first run with a 270-degree spin onto the rail, and a 180 off, followed by a backside 900 spin, a backside 1,260 — four rotations — and finished with a 900-degree spin for a score of 94.5. “I don’t ever mind cruddy conditions,” Guldemond said. “I do pretty good in bad conditions.”

The United States Open was Guldemond’s 22nd competition this season. With the victory, he also clinched the Burton Global Open Series championship, a six-stop series. The payday for the two amounted to $120,000.

Sébastien Toutant, a 16-year-old from Montreal, was second in men’s slopestyle with a score of 92.17. Toutant had a loud cheering section during each of his runs. Afterward, his fans chanted, “Olé, olé, olé,” when his name was announced at the awards ceremony. Scotty Lago, of Seabrook, N.H., finished third with a score of 90.83.

Lago also won the quarterpipe competition at the Open on Friday night and was named the men’s best overall rider. “I am so pumped being the best overall rider at a contest with so much history,” Lago said about the Open, now in its 27th year. “Today is the best day I’ve ever had in snowboarding.” For the men, the Open was the last competitive event before the Olympic qualifying season begins next winter.

But with White out, Peetu Piiroinen, of Finland, clinched the season points standings and received the award Sunday night. Piiroinen finished second in the halfpipe finals Saturday and fourth in slopestyle. Jamie Anderson, the defending champion of the women’s T.T.R. World Tour, missed the Open competition because of an injury. Anderson leads the points standings this season heading into the final women’s event at the Roxy Chicken Jam from March 27 to 29 at Mammoth Mountain, Calif. Oestgaard Buaas is seventh in the standings. With her victory Sunday, she remains in contention for the title.

So whats all this slopestyle about – if you are new to the sport of snowboarding we thought you would be interested to see what we are talking about above when we refer to Oestgaard Buaas and Chas Gudemond runs above – 180 spins off the rail/onto the rail, 1,260s, backside 900 spins, frontside 720s……well check out the action from the 2007 US Open which was also held at Stratton, Vermont – thanks GuerillaGuru for the great video – now see if you can determine what spins these dudes are demonstrating.

Our attention was grabbed this morning by news that the ski jump at Brattleboro, Vermont, New Hampshire has been restored to its former glory.

For decades, ski jumpers from around the world launched themselves off the ski jump at Brattleboro’s Harris Hill. The 90-meter wooden jump built by Fred Harris in 1922 was an extreme sports mecca before there was such a thing as extreme sports, but it was deemed unsafe in 2005.

Since then, the community has pitched in to regrade the hill, erect new steel towers and spectator steps and put up a new inrun for skiers to speed down before taking off.

As ski jumping is an extreme that we have rarely covered in the XtremeSport4u blog we thought it might interest our readers to learn a little more about this sport – as ever we are indebted to Wikipedia who have kindly provided some information.

Ski jumping originates from Norway when a soldier launched himself 9.5 metres in the air in front of an audience in 1809. By 1862, ski jumpers were tackling much larger jumps and travelling longer. The first proper competition was held in Trysil in 1862.

Today world ski jump competitions are held on one of three types of hill:

Normal hill competitions

for which the calculation line is found at approximately 80–100 metres (260–330 ft). Distances of up to and over 110 metres (360 ft) can be reached.

Large hill competitions

for which the calculation line is found at approximately 120–130 metres (390–430 ft). Distances of over 145 metres (480 ft) can be obtained on the larger hills. Both individual and team competitions are run on these hills.

Ski-flying competitions

for which the calculation line is found at 185 metres (610 ft). The Ski Flying World Record of 239 metres (780 ft) is held by Bjørn Einar Romøren, and was set in Planica, Slovenia in March 2005.

We can only hope that with the restoration of the ski jump at Brattleboro that U.S. ski jumpers will start to challenge for medals in a sport that has always seemed to be the preserve of Scandinavian and Central European athletes with the only exception to this group of countries being Japan.

The video below from RafalStrek shows six of the biggest ever ski jumps in history with individuals flying through the air for up to 150 metres – awesome, inspiring and frightening but deserving so much respect.

[youtube=http://fr.youtube.com/watch?v=kwICYTylnq8]

And if you ever wondered why this sport is so extreme take a look at Bjorn Einar Ramoren crashing in competition last year – with thanks to TheFinnKingVIII for the video. Thankfully Bjorn was able to walk away from the incident but it does show that you have to be a certain kind of person to launch yourself into the air – good luck et bon courage to those Vermonters brave enough to let go!

[youtube=http://fr.youtube.com/watch?v=9TAvoizQreg]

It all began nearly 500 years ago, the year 1520 to be precise, when a Swedish nobleman, Gustav Eriksson Vasa, fled the blood letting troops of King Christian II of Denmark, who only weeks before had executed Vasa’s father and brother with 80 other Swedes, in what became known as Stockholm’s bloodbath. Vasa fled to Mora where he attempted to persuade the people to rise in revolt against the Danes but before they gave him an answer the impending arrival of Danish troops was announed and Vasa fled.

Within days news of the Stockholm bloodbath had arrived in Mora and the people wished Vasa was still with them to lead the rebellion. They sent their two fastest skiers after him and they caught up with him at Salen and persuaded him to turn back. That was Sweden’s first Vasalopp. The rest is history as they say – 3 years later Gustav Eriksson Vasa was elected king of a free Sweden.

It was not until 1922 that the people of Mora voted to hold a race between Salen and Mora, a distance of 90 kms (56 miles) and on March 19th 1922 the Vasaloppet, as it became known, was again raced with 119 starters with the winner, Ernst Alm, coming home in 7 hours 32 minutes 49 seconds.

Today there is a whole week of fun, sking, music and festivities. The skiing now includes non competitive events, 30 kms races, races for girls only and for all ages – as many as 140,000 people have participated in one year alone! This is Europe’s greatest ski fest and the big race itself, which is now completed in as little as 3 hours 40 minutes has been won, other than by Swedes, by individuals from Norway, Finland, Germany, Russia and France. There have been many unique and sporting occurences in the 86 years of the race. Below you will see the profile of the 90 km course from Salen to Mora.

Entries for the 2009 event – which starts on February 20th and finishes with the Vasaloppet itself on March 1st have already reached over 30,000 and can be found on the official website – jusy click on the following link http://www.vasaloppet.se/wps/VasaCMS/generated/resources.Loppbasinfo/anmalan/enanmalan.html and choose which event is for you.

Finally you can see some of the fun in the video below from magnuslindgren – this sport is very tough and very extreme.