Sarah Hendrickson (USA) won the first-ever women’s ski jumping World Cup in Lillehammer, Norway on Saturday. She was the only competitor to break 100 meters, jumping 100.5 meters on her first jump and 95.5 meters on her second for an overall 29.3-point win over Coline Mattel (FRA) on the 100 meter hill.

In a Facebook update from USSA, Hendrickson said, “Winning the first World Cup gives me a really good feeling. I did great on my first jump and that was the base for winning. I didn’t have a good season last year but trained hard in summer and it paid off. It’s really cool mixing with the men. It gave us even more attention.”

As for being part of a historic moment in skiing women’s sports history, the 17-year-old modest: “Lindsey Van is my idol. I was there when she won the first World Championship title 2009 in Liberec. She made sports history and I thought: I want to be like her. Today I could achieve that, at least a little bit.”

In a 46-woman field, the rest of the American women fared well. Jessica Jerome was 12th, Alissa Johnson 19th and Abby Hughes 21st. Lindsey Van sat out the competition due to a hip injury suffered in October.

Full results.

Men and women will jump together as part of a normal-hill team event, which will be introduced at the 2013 FIS Nordic World Ski Championships in Val di Fiemme, Italy. The International Ski Federation (FIS) decided to approve the ski-jumping event, which will include two male and two female jumpers per national team, at its recent autumn meeting, the Helsingin Sanomat reported.

The move is significant, especially for about 120 female ski jumpers competing internationally. Women were first allowed to jump at the 2009 World Championships and participate in a team event at the 2011 Worlds. In April, women’s ski-jumping was approved as an Olympic sport for the 2014 Games, and the inaugural women’s World Cup will take place this season.

While the moves seem like victories to the sport and to female competitors, not everyone was happy with the news about the mixed-team format.

“In my opinion, this is slightly questionable,” Matti Pulli,Finland’s former head of ski jumping and nordic combined, told the Finnish newspaper. “It is the type of discipline that as a parent I would not necessarily advise my daughters to get involved in. It is a completely different thing when you pick up a team sport where you are constantly surrounded by friends and where the cost of the equipment is on a different scale.”

Click here for the full story or the FIS Ski Jumping website.

Lots going on in the ski world over the past two days:

–According to Norwegian broadcaster NRK, the preliminary ski jumping program for the next season includes two mixed-gender team competitions. Both men and women will compete together, much like the mixed relay event in biathlon.
–The Norwegian skiers are in the middle of a training camp on Fuerteventura in the Canary Islands. The women are recently returned from vacations – Vibeke Skofterud was in Africa and Bali, Therese Johaug went to Dubai, and Marit Bjoergen was in the Carribean – while Petter Northug just went home. He’s sick.

–Speaking of the Norwegians, NRK is reporting that a number of past greats were asked to apply for the job of the national team men’s coach, including Oddvar Bra, Frode Estil, Thomas Alsgaard, and Pål Gunnar Mikkelsplass. All of them declined, leaving Fredrik Aukland and Trond Nystad the only Norwegians in the pool. In other Norwegian news, Johaug just had her debut as an underwater model.

–Swedish sprinter Mats Larsson is retiring.

–APU is back in training.

–A charitable trust has raised about half the funding necessary to purchase the Snow Farm, in New Zealand, from its current owners. The Snow Farm is where the U.S. and Canada typically travel for their summer on-snow training camps.

–The Canadians apparently will get to go for a ride on a sweet train.

–Rather than make snow, the organizers of the Sochi Olympic Games in 2014 have opted for a system that relies primarily on saving the white stuff from the previous season, using technology from Finland. According to this article in the Voice of Russia, half of the facilities for the Sochi Games are ready.

–Justyna Kowalczyk will begin her first training camp in Ramsau in two weeks.

–The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) upheld the two-year ban handed down to Russian former Olympic champion Julia Chepalova. Chepalova had originally been suspended by the International Ski Federation for using the blood-boosting drug EPO, but she argued before CAS that her samples had been mis-tested. The Russian website SkiSport.ru has more on the case, including a reaction from Chepalova, although the translation is rough.

–Steamboat Springs will host a nordic combined Continental Cup this year. According to the Steamboat Pilot, it will the first such event at the venue since 2007.

–Former nordic combined World Cup champion Anssi Koivuranta of Finland is contemplating whether to compete only in ski jumping this year, after illness over the summer hurt his endurance training.

–Swedish sprinter Bjorn Lind is planning on tackling long-distance races this year.

–Dario Cologna will not eat pizza in Norway. I don’t think I would, either.

–According to this piece in the Wall Street Journal, USSA’s sponsorship revenue is down 45 percent from eight years ago, and the organization has hired a former NHL executive, Andrew Judelson, to pick up the slack.

–FIS news: A quick interview with Frederik Aukland, Dario Cologna’s coach. (Read this translated piece from the 2009 Tour de Ski for background–the Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten followed Aukland around on a day when Cologna won a stage.) Axel Teichmann is now a father. There’s a Venezuelan skier (the Venezuelan skier?) training in New Zealand.

–A bunch of masters went sand skiing somewhere in Britain, and made the papers.

–The Park Record, in Park City, has a thorough recap of last weekend’s ski jumping and nordic combined championships.

–With all the focus on the U.S. and Canadian ski teams training in New Zealand, it’s easy to forget that the Waiorau Snow Farm usually gets another handful of North American visitors throughout the summer, including college students studying abroad and others just on trips. But Bowdoin College’s blog has an entertaining account from Spencer Eusden, who camped on a frigid beach, scraped his skis by van headlights, then hitchhiked up the access road to the Snow Farm to get some skiing in. And Mount Blue High School skier Shelby Aseltine–at the Snow Farm for a camp–took on the U.S. Ski Team and beat them in a game of dice.

–FIS has an update from the Russian national team, who just finished a training camp in Rybinsk.

–Petter Northug and Marcus Hellner will meet again in a rollerski sprint in Hamar, Norway, later this month.

–Steamboat Springs is considering an application for a $700,000 grant to resurface one of its smaller jumps, which would allow younger athletes to train on it during the summer.

–The Vancouver Sun has a reporter in Sochi previewing some of the work being done in advance of the 2014 Winter Olympic Games there. He’s got some interesting information about the environmental associated with the development being done, and a bit on the ski jumps.

–The sport manager at Whistler Olympic Park has expressed interest in hosting a women’s ski jumping World Cup once the circuit’s inaugural season gets underway in 2011-2012.

–FIS has a short piece on Dario Cologna and his training on the Sognefjell Glacier.

–The Scandinavians are STILL racing.

WHISTLER OLYMPIC PARK, BC (Feb. 13) – After qualifying Friday to compete in the medal round on Saturday, the young Olympic Ski Jumping Team missed out on the top-30 final of Saturday’s normal hill competition. Swiss Simon Amman, who swept the two events at the 2002 Olympics, won the first gold medal of the Games.

Peter Frenette (Saranac Lake, NY) and Nick Alexander (Lebanon, NH) tied for 41st with scores of 106.5 on their first-round jumps, while two-time Olympian Anders Johnson (Park City, UT) was 49th.

“The last two days haven’t been my best two jumps, but it’s alright, it happens,” Johnson said. “I’m still having fun, so that’s key.”

Amman combined jumps of 105.0 and 108.5 (check this) to win.

“I just sort of choked on that jump,” Alexander said afterward. “I had an amazing jump before. I was tied for third or fourth in the trial rounds. I’ve just got to keep my head together.”

Ten days away from his 18th birthday, Frenette is the youngest male competitor on the U.S. Olympic Team, and he kept things in perspective after a jump that quite live up to his expectations.

“I’m one of the youngest to do it, so that’s good, looking forward to my career,” Frenette said. “It’s just a starting point. Hopefully, (I’ll) keep building from the Olympics and get better and hopefully be one of the best one day.”

“He had a big chance,” said 1976 Olympic silver medalist Jochen Danneberg, the Olympic Ski Jumping Team coach who works with athletes in the Project X jumping program. “I think he was too nervous. He laid the pressure on himself.”

It was understandable, considering Frenette had never jumped on a World Cup stage and was making his international top-flight debut.

It was quite an achievement for the entire group to reach the finals in Friday’s qualification, in which Frenette was 30th with a score of 115.0, Alexander was 35th, and Johnson was 40th.

All three competitors will participate in the large hill event, with qualification slated for next Friday and medal rounds on Saturday.

Pressure aside, though, these athletes have two more weeks to enjoy the games, and they plan on soaking them in.

“It’s awesome, it’s a great experience,” Johnson said. “So far these Olympics have run really well and really smooth, and everybody’s having a good time.”

OFFICIAL RESULTS
2010 OLYMPIC WINTER GAMES
Whistler Olympic Park, BC – Feb. 13
Normal Hill Competition

1. Simon Ammann, Switzerland, 276.5
2. Adam Malysz, Poland, 269.5
3. Gregor Schlierenzauer, Austria, 268.0
4. Janne Ahonen, Finland, 263.0
5. Michael Uhrmann, Germany, 262.5
-
T-41. Peter Frenette, Saranac Lake, NY, 106.5
T-41. Nick Alexander, Lebanon, NH, 106.5
49. Anders Johnson, Park City, UT, 92.5

Source: USSA

The young US Men’s Ski Jumping team had a successful 1st day at the Olympics, placing all three athletes in the top-40. This means that they will compee in the 2nd round on Saturday.

Peter Frenette (Saranac Lake, N.Y.),  was 30th after Friday’s first round with a score of 115.0. Nick Alexander (Lebanon, N.H.) tied for 35th with a 113.0, while Anders Johnson (Park City, Utah) tied for the 40th and final qualifying spot with a 108.5. Germany’s Michael Uhrmann finished at the top of the first round with a 138.5.

“Our goal is to show our best ski jumps this winter here, not at another place,” said Jochen Danneberg, the 1976 Olympic silver medalist for East Germany who coaches the U.S. Ski Jumping Team as part of the Project X jumping program. “It’s the right place to do it.”

Seventeen-year-old Peter Frenette (Saranac Lake, NY) led the U.S. trio in 30th, jumping 97 meters and earning a score of 115.0 as friends, family and U.S. supporters urged him on.

“It’s nice,” Frenette said of his cheering section. “I had dinner with them last night. They had some words of encouragement for me today, and it’s good to have some people that we know.

“I’ve usually been jumping on the level below world class, so I’ve been watching these guys on TV,” Frenette said. “Coming here and seeing them compete against me is definitely a shock. It’s exciting.”