The Norwegian men took 5 of the top 6 spots in the classic sprint qualification. Boerre Naess led the way with a 1.56 second victory over Nikita Kriukov of Russia. Several of the Norweigans opted to double pole the entire course - an impressive display of strength. Torin Koos had his best qualification performance of the season, finishing 7th, +3.75. Andy Newell advanced with an uncharacteristically slow 16th - especially in classic. Chris Cook will ski in his first World Cup heats of the season, squeaking through in 30th, just .05 seconds ahead of Canadian Stefan Kuhn. Sean Crooks and Phil Widmer of Canada both advanced to the heats, qualifying in 18th and 24th respectively. Reid Pletcher (USA) had an impressive race, finishing 35th. The rest of the American men were outside of the top 45. Devon Kershaw (CAN) was unable to match his strong finish of yesterday, placing 36th.

The three Americans are each in a different quarterfinal heat. The Canadians are also separated - though Koos and Widmer will match up in Heat 2.

Torin Koos qualifying 7th

Emil Joensson (SWE) first out of the gate. He qualified 14th.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 23rd, 2008 at 1:41 pm and is filed under Sprint. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.