Statistical Skier

My eyes are a bit bleary from grading all day, otherwise I’d try to watch some of the WJC/U23 racing action that appears to be available online. As it is, here’s what’s been cooking here over the last week:

• Wrapping up a weekend of racing on both WC circuits before they take this one off: men’s and women’s classic distance races in Otepää, the classic sprints the next day, and the men’s and women’s biathlon mass start races.
• With Marit Björgen continuing her winning ways, I took a look at how to more fairly compare her record with that of Bente Skari and Elena Välbe.
• Another recap of the WC sprint heats and some other various odds and ends that occurred to me.
• In honor of the racing action being focused in the nation of Estonia, I devoted a post to the question of whether Andrus Veerpalu really does race unusually well at big events like the Olympics and World Championships.
• A brief summary of the results for two American biathletes who’ve been skiing well lately.
• I showed a little graphical evidence of something that I’ve mentioned a few times: that the men’s heats in WC sprint races are more likely to become slower as the day goes on than the women’s heats.
• Finally, an attempt to put the races of several of the U23 racers efforts in some more helpful context.