TOUR DE SKI. Justyna Kowalczyk of Poland grabbed victory in stage 2 of Tour de Ski over 10 km Classic with handicap start. She is now the overall as well as the sprint Tour de Ski leader.

It didnt' take much time before 4 girls were gathered in the second stage of Tour de Ski. Current leader Justyna Kowalczyk, Marit Bjoergen, Therese Johaug and Aina Kaisa Saarinen were all eager to secure the win and thereby becoming the overall Tour de Ski leader. Saarinen increased the pace early in the stage, and the three other girls didn't have much other choice than following her. With tricky snow conditions, they were fighting hard both up-and downhill.Saarinen seemed to have great skis, and made it a tough race.

In final round out of 3, Johaug and Kowalczyk swopped roles in terms of who led the group. Johaug, who has her strength uphill showed that she is a candidate for the overall Tour de Ski win. Coming down the last  hill, before the approximate 500 long flat course leading to the finish line, Johaug had a small gap to Kowalczyk. Fighting and sprinting to be the first crossing the finish line, Johaug lost wit +0.2 seconds. Bjoergen finished third, +7.2 seconds behing, followed by Aino-Kaisa Saarinen with +16.3 seconds behind. Kowalczyk won another important 15 bonus seconds with her win, Therese got 10 and Bjoergen 5. The overall Tour de Ski standing gets interesting after day 2, with the following standing:

1 KOWALCZYK Justyna POL 31:49.4
2 JOHAUG Therese NOR +5.2
3 BJOERGEN Marit NOR +17.1

The main group of approximate 15 skiers did not manage to keep up with the 4 strong girls, and remained as a group throughout the stage. Krista Lahteenmaki had a small gap ahead of the others at finish, but was +53.4 seconds behind Kowalczyk. Yesterdays third place winner, Hanna Brodin had to let go quite early and ended up on 53rd place, +3:14:8 behind.

The third stage of Tour de Ski continues in Oberstdorf, Germany tomorrow with classic sprint.

Quote from Justyna Kowalczyk:

"This was a really tough race, the snow was really difficult, the skis didn't work perfect but I am really satisfied that I'm number one in the second stage. I think the best idea today was to ski on no wax skis, which I also had.

Therese Johaug can be really strong throughout the Tour, her best race is definitely up Alpe Cermis, where I will need at least a 2 minutes gap if I want to beat her. We still have seven stages left, so we'll see.

Aino-Kaisa works the same way pretty much every race, she always ski really fast, and it looked like her skis were perfect".

Sofie Torlei Olsen
FIScrosscountry.com
Friday 30 December 2011

Axel Teichmann secures victory in stage 2 of Tour de Ski

Axel Teichmann takes full advantage of the mayhem in the last curve before the finishing straight and takes the stage win for Germany. Petter Northug claims second place ahead of Dario Cologna.

The big surprise of the day didn’t come until the end of the 15 km classic pursuit handicap start. A thrilled Axel Teichmann could celebrate his stage win in front of thousands of excited spectators on home ground. The new overall Tour de Ski leader was awarded with the red leader bib. Petter Northug remains the overall Sprint leader from yesterday, and will ski with the black Sprint leader bib tomorrow.

The race started as expected; the two big Tour favourites Northug and Cologna allowed the bunch of athletes behind them to ski along with them, and the main field of athletes skied together in all five rounds. At the last uphill, Dario Cologna and Matti Heikkinen, both who were in front, had an unlucky fall which gave Teichmann a gap to the others. Petter Northug managed to ski around Heikkinen and could start his chase for Teichmann. At the last flat part of the stadium, Teichmann was strongest however, Northug realized he couldn’t close the gap and came in second, +2.3 seconds behind. Cologna fought back and secured the third spot, with +2.9 seconds down to Teichmann. Top 3 of the day won respectively 15, 10 and 5 bonus seconds at the finish line.

Having faced severe critics from national media lately, the German team showed that they are still to be counted in the overall Tour de Ski podium. Lead by Teichmann, Angerer, Filbrich , Kuehne and Tscharnke, the German team kept their positions up front and worked together as a team.

Tour de Ski keeps the excitement of who will be the first person up Alpe Cermis on January 8th. Axel Teichmann leads with 7.3 seconds ahead of Northug, followed by Cologna which is 12.9 seconds behind.

It was a happy and proud Teichmann who met with the press after the race. As he said in an interview yesterday: "I can be satisfied now, there are still eight more stages left which makes me confident that I will finally get within the main leaders".

“It felt really good to win, we had great skis today, we showed our strength of our team and it was simply a great day for the German team. I had a good feeling throughout the race, we did a lot of training on double poling this summer, and even though I thought Petter would come closer to me before the finish, I was able to keep the lead”.

The current Tour de Ski Sprint leader, Petter Northug was pleased with his second place today, saying the crash before the finish probably helped him reach the podium. “I was on the back skis of Matti Heikkinen as I saw him fall right in front of me, I had to go out in the snow, but I think I was lucky I didn’t fall”. Satisfied with the two first days in Oberhof, Northug is focusing on the two coming stages in Oberstdorf. “I didn’t do well in Oberstdorf last year; I want to change that this year”.

Tour de Ski continues with classic sprint in Oberstdorf tomorrow.

Sofie Torlei Olsen
FIScrosscountry.com
Friday 30 December 2011