Results BLINK Festivalen 2022

The 17th edition of the Blink Festivalen in Norway welcomed international Cross-Country elite runners on the star line. With the Lysebotn Opp, the 7.5km uphill race, a prestigious competition opened the four-day event in the south west of Norway.

Results Lysebotn Opp

Besides the challenging race course, wet and windy conditions set the stage for the 640m altitude competition between the Fjords of Norway. The women’s elite races saw a super strong Sophia Laukli from the US National Team taking the victory in a time of 35:16 minutes. Laukli, who had shown an impressive season start during the past Cross-Country World Cup season, even left Norwegian top runners such as Heidi Weng, Ragnhild Gløersen Haga and and Tiril Weng behind. 13 seconds off the fastest time, Delphine Claudel from France fought the strongest competition for Laukli and was rewarded with the second position. Third came Heidi Weng who bet fourth ranked Flora Dolci by one second.

The men’s elite race was again a grand show off between Simen Hegstad Krüger and his favorite opponent on the race course, Hans Christer Holund. Krüger, the Olympic bronze medalist of the Men’s shortened 50km at Beijing Olympics, whose winter had been marked by a positive Covid test and quarantine just before his departure to the Games, took charge of the Lysebotn Opp course track and impressively showed to be in top shape again. Holund, who was on the catch followed 17 seconds behind onto the second rank and Andorran skier Ireneu Esteve Altimiras caught the last podium spot, 30 second off the fastest time of Krüger of 28:55.

A special feature of the Blink Festivalen on that first racing day already marked the Lysebotn Opp double poling competition that attracts a large starter field of long-distance Cross-Country skiers. Last years winner in the mens category – and FIS Cross-Country athlete – Andrew Musgrave from Team Great Britain (and Team Næringsbanken in Ski Classic competitions), was given a hard time for defending his title.

Johan Hoel and Herman Paus kept the fight for the victory until the finish line, where Hoel took the win by only just 1 second before Paus. Musgrave hit the third rank with a time of 32:33 minutes.

The womens double poling competition was taken by no other than Astrid Øyra Slind.

Results BLINK Classics

For the 52km competition in Classic technique, four rounds of 13km each were on schedule for the elite categories. The starter field of the double poling competition was a great mix of athletes from the World Cup and Ski Classics.

Women and men started out at the same time and thus, large groups were formed and tactics could be played. Linn Sömskar (SWE), Astrid Øyre Slind (NOR) and Victoria Carl (GER) managed to stay with the faster pacing men’s field and took the lead for the women’s categories. Carl managed to stay with the Ski Classics athletes until half way into the race but finally had to focus on her own pace to defend her secured podium spot.

Up front, Slind endured a broken pole in the third lap and could not catch up with Linn Sömskar who skied off to her victory. With a finishing time of 2:02:18.9, she finished around 3 minutes off the fastest time from the men.

Max Novak and Andrew Musgrave took the lead in the mens rankings and fought until the finish line to set the fastest time of the day. Novak, who had raced to the 11th rank a day earlier seemed to have an extra powerful stride left against Musgrave, and won the BLINK Classic 0.1 second before the man from Team GBR. Third on the podium got Norwegian Magnus Vesterheim.

Results 10km/15km Mass start

Another day, another race – BLINK Festivalen kept the participants on their race feet. With the mass start competitions, a special format awaited the racers. The town center of Sadnes set the stage with a 1.1km course which made the women take 9 and the men 13 laps.

The women’s 10km start line was ready with international competition. Along with the line up of Scandinavian skiers, Victoria Carl represented Germany and joined the skiers from the Italian delegation that arrived under the lead of expert coach Markus Cramer. Also France had traveled with four female athletes to the event as well as Slovenian’s Sprint expert Eva Urevc, Katerina Janatova from Czechia. Nadine Fähndrich from Switzerland was signed up again as well and with Qinghua Ma, also a Chinese National Team athlete was present.

Despite the format keeping the group together for a long time, it was again Linn Sömskar who put the hammer down and showed the competitor field what excellent Rollerski athlete she is. With Carl and Urevc on her heels, she claims the victory by 0.7 seconds.

The men’s competition held a qualification round and gave out “wildcards” to limit the field to 35 total skiers for the actual mass start race.

With the short loop, the competitor field had to play the cards right to risk breaking away. Therefore, the group remained in position round after round and out of 35 skiers, 27 arrived within 10 seconds off the fastest time. That time was set by Arnaud Chautemps from France, a great surprise of the day, as he had top Sprinters such as Federico Pellegrino (ITA, 2nd), Renaud Jay (FRA, 3rd) and Lucas Chanavat (FRA, 5th) and the local Sprint stars Håvard Solås Taugbøl as well as Sindre Bjørnestad Skar on his heels.

With two fantastic race days ahead, unfortunately Andrew Musgrave got tangled in a fence at the final stretch and was taken out of competition right away.

Results Sprint

Saturday marked the final race day and with a Sprint and the highlight for the crowds around the BLINK Festivalen. The same race course as on the mass start on Friday marked the Sprint profile.

The spots to qualify did not come easy with tight margins deciding to qualify or not. Linn Sömskar kept everything under control, winning all her heats throughout the finals where she faced her contenders from the day before again with Eva Urevc, Nadine Fähndrich, Victoria Carl along with Juile Bjervig Drivenes and Kathrine Harsem.

Sömskar successfully completed three out of the four races at BLINK with a victory and was the big winner of the race series. Eva Urevc re-claimed the podium as well and the third place was claimed by Fähndrich from Switzerland.

As during previous race days of BLINK, Team Great Britain had their skiers ready to claim the top spots of the series. This time, it was James Clugnet who celebrated the victory ahead of Alfred Buskvist (SWE) and Gjoeran Tefre (NOR). With Andrew Young, the British team dominated the Sprint finals as Young claimed the fourth spot. Rollerski Sprinter Matteo Tanel from Italy claimed the fifth place before Lucas Chanavat from France.

Click here to see all results from Blink Festivalen 2022.