Hailey Swirbul and the Way Opened by Jessie Diggins: by Paolo Romaniemi – FasterSkier com fasterskier.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from fasterskier.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
This past season brought with it Hailey Swirbul’s greatest individual result as a professional cross-country ski racer. But any real satisfaction she received always came when racing alongside her teammates, notably during world champs.
Aspen’s Simi Hamilton, left, and wife, Sophie Caldwell Hamilton, pose on Monday, April 12, 2021, near the AVSC Clubhouse in Aspen. Both mainstays on the U.S. cross-country ski team this past decade, the couple has recently retired and relocated to the Roaring Fork Valley.
Austin Colbert/The Aspen Times
Aspen’s Simi Hamilton wasn’t chasing any last shot at eternal glory. In many ways, he already achieved that after a decade-plus on the U.S. cross-country ski team.
But, the 33-year-old had a chance to go out on his own terms. He had a chance to spend one more season on the World Cup mentoring the next generation of American athletes. He had a chance to be part of a thriving team dynamic he holds dearly one final time.
Basalt s Hailey Swirbul reflects on first world championships ahead of season s final cross country races aspentimes.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from aspentimes.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
In a winter when most Americans could use a good news story to lift their patriotic spirits, we find one unfolding â albeit 4,000 miles from here â in snow-covered places like Italy, Switzerland, Germany and Finland. Thatâs where the womenâs U.S. Cross-Country Ski Team, led by the standout performances from its top racers Jessie Diggins and Rosie Brennan, is opening new ground in a sport long dominated by European nations.
Since the first Winter Games in 1924, the United States has just two Olympic medals in cross-country skiing: Brattleboro, Vt.âs Bill Koch won a silver in the 1976 Olympics, and 42 years later the womenâs team eked out a gold in the 2018 Pyeongchang Games. (For comparison, Norway has 121 Olympic medals in Nordic ski racing. Russian and Soviet skiers have 109. Sweden and Finland, 80 apiece. With its two medals, the U.S. is tied with Slovenia; only Bulgaria has fewer, one.)