Canadian Women make Nordic Ski History
It was a historic day in Canadian Ski history as 3 Canadian Women finished in the top 10 at the Cross Country World Cup in Asiago Italy. In the morning knockout sprint competition Beckie Scott from Vermilion Alberta qualified in third place, followed by St. Quentin New Brunswick's Milaine Theriault in 5th and Canmore Alberta's Sara Renner in 9th.
In the afternoon knockout rounds, Sara Renner finished 3rd in her quarter final heat, failing to advance by less than a second, behind Hilde Pedersen of Norway. Her final ranking was 9th. Milaine Theriault and Beckie Scott finished second in each of their quarterfinal heats to advance to the semifinals. Beckie and Milaine ended up in opposite semi final heats with Milaine finishing 3rd to end up in the "B" final that determines 4th through 8th place and Beckie Scott advancing to the Final Four by virtue of her second place finish in the semis.
Milaine finished as the 4th skier in the B Final , earning her an 8th place finish on the day, 3 seconds from 4th place and Beckie captured the Bronze Medal in the Final Four, less than a second from silver medallist Petra Majdic from Slovenia and a little over 4 seconds from the race winner Bente Skari.This was Beckie's second ever World Cup podium finish, who won a bronze at the Pre Olympic World Cup last season at Soldiers Hollow, USA. The 4th place finisher was Finland's Kati Sundqvist, the silver medallist in the sprint at last year's World Championships.
It was an exciting day for the Canadian Womens team, and was the highlight to date on the December World Cup tour that has seen a 5th place result from Beckie in the Sprint event in Cogne, Italy and a 9th place finish in the 5km World Cup event also in Cogne. The Olympic bound relay skiers that include sisters Jaime and Amanda Fortier of Edmonton Alberta, also came through with a fine 7th place finish this past weekend in the Davos, Switzerland World Cup relay. With 2 Russian teams in the top 3, Canada ranked 6th out of 13 official teams (1 per nation) and in an Olympic competition would have finished 38 seconds from the bronze medal position after 20 kilometres of racing. This is an improvement on their 2001 World Championship result where Canada finished 6th over a minute and 20 seconds from bronze position, 3 seconds from 4th and .4 seconds from 5th.
Quotes from Beckie Scott, only the second Canadian Woman to win an individual World Cup medal, and now the only multi World Cup medallist in individual events:
"I'm really excited about the result. It was a great day for all of us, the whole team did outstanding."
"Things are going really well this season. This was what I was looking forward to and hoping for when I started the World Cup season, to open with really good results."
"I think I've just gained experience and confidence. For sure it is a real boost going into the Olympics"
The World Cup tour wraps up for the Canadian team with a 15km mass start free technique World Cup in Ramsau Austria. From there the team will return for Pre-Olympic preparation and competitions in Canmore Alberta and Vernon BC in early January.