A commenter on my last post correctly pointed out that it might be interesting to look at performance using a percent back based measure on the qualifying times, since the number of racers present can greatly effect finishing place. I didn’t quite have time to pull together the standardization piece that I typically use with […]
Also tagged andrew newell, canada, kikkan randall, men, Sprint, women, World CupIt’s always fun when the World Cup takes a turn through North America, although I’m a cranky old traditionalist, so sprints aren’t my favorite event, and city sprints are even further down the list for me. One challenge that comes up in trying to assess performance in WCs held in North America is that the […]
Also tagged Analysis, canada, city sprint, men, Sprint, women, World CupNothing earth shattering about saying, but the US women have clearly made some significant strides in their distance skiing over the past 2-3 seasons. Let’s visualize this first comparing Kikkan Randall to the other US women: Pretty dramatic all around. For some context, let’s plot the same data (but without all the fancy shading) along […]
Also tagged Distance, men, women, World CupContinuing on with some notes about the World Cup opener in Gällivare last weekend. It’s always the case in a season opener that much will be made of a handful of people who had unexpectedly good or bad races. Usually, this is an overreaction. But let’s play that game anyway and look at two skiers […]
Also tagged andrew musgrave, canada, field depth, gallivare, justyna kowalczyk, women, World CupKris Freeman and Kikkan Randall have been basically the top US skiers for quite some time now. (I’m sort of brushing Andrew Newell under the rug here, mostly just due to time contraints. I’ll do a follow up on him next week.) Freeman has been more or less unquestionably the best US male distance skier […]
Also tagged Distance, domestic, holly brooks, ida sargent, jessie diggins, kikkan randall, kris freeman, lars flora, liz stephen, noah hoffman, sadie bjornsen, Sprint, sylvan ellefson, tad elliottThis is by no means a comprehensive look at how we fared this year, just one perspective based on a single graph. One of the things that I pay closest attention to is depth: how many different skiers do we have performing at a particular level. The reason for this is that for relatively “small” […]
Also tagged 2011-2012, Analysis, canada, men, north america, season recap, women, World CupI’ve commented on this before, but here’s a slightly more comprehensive look at the historical record. Here is a plot showing Kikkan Randall’s World Cup sprint results as well as those for any other American woman: Note the handful of top twenties just this season, and there’s certainly more results clustered around 30th or so, […]
Also tagged Analysis, Distance, kikkan randall, Sprint, women