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Head-to-Head: Marit vs Justyna

This is the head to head matchup that was runner up in my recent reader poll.  No reason not to keep everyone happy by tackling this pair next!

Per usual, what I’m doing is taking races where Marit Bjoergen and Justyna Kowalczyk have both participated and plotting the difference of their FIS points (distance races) or the difference of their finishing place (sprint races) versus time.

Continue reading ›

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2010 07 07 Joran Head-To-Head Comments (3) Permalink

Race Summaries: Introduction

This is type of graphic that I hope to do on a semi-regular basis once the World Cup season gets rolling.  These easily fall into the “fun” rather than “serious” category.  If you hadn’t already guessed, I like making graphs.  So these entries will be race summaries, but in graph form.  They are fairly labor intensive (manually scraping PDF files for split times, push the data around and annotate it by hand, etc.) so I’m going to pick and choose when I do this, ideally focusing on races that are interesting for some reason.

Here’s an example using the Men’s Olympic Relay from the Vancouver Olympics (click for a larger version):


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2010 07 05 Joran Fun Stuff Comments (5) Permalink

Week In Review: Friday July 2nd

My first full month of blogging is in the books!  I’ll be travelling a bit over the next ten days, so posting might be a little lighter than usual, but not much.  I’ve got a bunch of stuff lined up already written…

Here’s a look back at what’s been going on here this past week:

  • I took my alternative FIS point method, EqPB, out for a drive to see how it handles.
  • We took a look at Kris Freeman’s victims and nemeses, which took us on a bit of a data detour.
  • I expressed my not so veiled opinion about the diversity of events in cross country skiing.
  • I took a look at skiers who’ve just missed the podium in a variety of unusual settings.
  • I gave a brief overview of shooting accuracy in biathlon
  • Finally, our retiring athlete series continues with Virpi Kuitunen.
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2010 07 02 Joran Week In Review Comments (0) Permalink

Career Retrospective: Virpi Kuitunen

Finnish skier Virpi Kuitunen is among the group of retiring skiers this year and she’s next in line for a retrospective look at her career.

First we need to dispense with the issue of doping.  Kuitunen was caught using a banned blood plasma expander at the 2001 World Championships in Lahti, Finland.  She received a 2 year suspension and then returned to racing.

Kuitunen has twice won the World Cup overall competition (2007, 2008).  I found 34 individual podium finishes[1. Including a victory in the pursuit at the 2001 WSC’s that she apparently was not disqualified from.] in distance events and 21 in sprints.  This includes Tour de Ski results as well, which she won in 2009.  She has never medalled in an individual race at the Olympics that I can see.  Her best Olympic results were a 5th in the sprint in 2006 and 9th in the 10km classic race, also in 2006. Continue reading ›

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2010 07 02 Joran Career Retrospective Comments (1) Permalink

Biathlon Shooting Accuracy

As I pore over my biathlon data, I learn new things all the time.  For instance, I really had no idea what a typical biathlete manages for shooting accuracy.  For some reason, I would have guessed something in the 60-70% range.  But I was way off… Continue reading ›

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2010 07 01 Joran Biathlon Comments (6) Permalink

Podium Heartbreak

Watching Devon Kershaw’s (CAN) amazing race in the Olympic 50k this past season was both thrilling and a bit heartbreaking.  There’s something of a reality distortion field that takes hold when the Olympics roll around that elevate the top three positions in a cross-country race to near mythic levels.

This is at least slightly bizarre, since, really, why three?  That’s totally arbitrary.  The ancient traditions that guide our sporting world could just as easily have designated the top five as the magic number to worship.

Podium-worship has crept out of the Olympic venue and into less prestigious races over time.  And I’m not really complaining.  There’s something to be said for tradition, meaningful or not.

But it’s a bit odd that we’ve created this arbitrary cutoff, that for no reason other than that we’ve all decided it to be the case, renders a 5th place finish at the Olympics a disappointment.  Which in Kershaw’s case, it kind of was, but kind of not.

If there’s a plus side to podium worship, it’s that it gives fans of the sport something to agonize over.  And any sport worth it’s salt has shit that fans can argue and debate and agonize over.  That’s what makes being a fan so fun!

So.  No one likes just missing a podium finish, particularly in big races like the Olympics or World Championships.  Where does Kershaw’s race stack up compared to results from recent history for Olympic and World Championships? Continue reading ›

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2010 06 30 Joran Uncategorized Comments (2) Permalink

FIS Scheduling Follies

I see on FasterSkier the news that there is already some angst regarding the FIS World Cup race calendar for next season.

I have two things say on this topic that takes the form of two graphs… Continue reading ›

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2010 06 29 Joran Fun Stuff Comments (3) Permalink