Rosie Brennan was all smiles in Ruka. Photo courtesy NordicFocus
After making a bit of history for herself on Saturday, Anchorage cross-country skier Rosie Brennan was eager to chase more glory.
Brennan started the World Cup season in top form, charging to second place in the 10-kilometer classic race during the opening weekend of racing in Ruka, Finland.
It was the eighth podium finish of her career — and her first in a classic-technique race.
“I’ve been really happy with the improvements I’ve made in classic skiing and it all worked out today,” Brennan said in a release from the U.S. Ski Team. “I’m very happy with my result.”
Happy, and raring to go again.
Brennan finished 4.9 seconds behind winner Ebba Andersson of Sweden, the winner of two gold medals at last season’s World Championships. Andersson won the race in 26 minutes, 46.7 seconds.
Brennan got faster as the race got longer — she was 12 seconds off Andersson’s time at the 6K mark but had narrowed the gap to 5.5 seconds at 8K. The effort left her itching for more.
“We have to fight again,” Brennan said in a race report by fis.com. “It was close.”
Brennan began the interval-start race two minutes ahead of Andersson and one minute after Frida Karlsson, whose third-place finish gave Sweden two spots on the podium.
Andersson led the entire race and Karlsson was in second place for the first half before Brennan overtook her.
When Brennan reached the finish, she had a 5-second gap on Karlsson and spent the next two minutes waiting to see Andersson’s time.
Brennan said her target during the race was Karlsson, because she wasn’t sure how Andersson was doing behind her.
“I didn’t really know what the fight was because (Andersson) was behind me but I was gaining on Frida, so I tried to just think ‘more and more seconds, more and more seconds,’ and when I finished I realized that it would be kind of close with Ebba,” Brennan said.
At age 34, Brennan appears to be at the top of her game. She placed fourth overall in last season’s World Cup standings and had a strong showing in some late-summer rollerskiing races in Sweden.
On the first day of racing in Ruka, Brennan posted the eighth-fastest qualifying time in a classic sprint race but was knocked out in the semifinals. “I couldn’t have asked for a better start to the season,” she said in a U.S. Ski Team report.
A two-time Olympian, Brennan is one of several Alaska Pacific University skiers racing in Ruka this weekend. Gus Schumacher and Novie McCabe each scored World Cup points with top-30 results Saturday, with Schumacher’s 22nd-place finish leading the U.S. men.
Martin Lowestrom Nyenget of Norway won the men’s 10K classic race in 23:31.7; Schumacher was 52.2 seconds back.
Other APU finishers included Scott Patterson in 53rd place (1:31.5 back), Luke Jager in 56th (1:38.1 back) and Zanden McMullen in 58th (1:39.3 back).
McCabe finished 30th in the women’s race, 1:36 off the winning pace. She was the second-fastest Under-23 age-group skier in the race. She was third among Americans, trailing Brennan and 11th-place Jessie Diggins of Minnesota.
In Friday’s sprint race, Brennan and J.C. Schoonmaker of APU were among four Americans who advanced to the heats. Schoonmaker was eliminated in the quarterfinals.
Racing wraps up Sunday with 20K freestyle races.