The Loneliness of The Long-Distance Skier

Seven national championships were at stake in the snow-covered countryside outside Putney, Vt., last week, but nobody except the contestants seemed to care. There was no grandstand at the finish line, only a dozen spectators and race officials were on hand to greet the racers, and no one offered the finishers so much as a cup of hot chocolate. In fact, one Putney resident passing by did not even know that the U.S. National Cross-Country Championship Races, the big so-called nordic skiing event of the year, were taking place almost in her backyard.

That kind of privacy is nothing new for long-distance (the shortest run is 5 km., or 3.1 miles) ski racers in the U.S. For years they have been skiing in the shadow of downhill racers at home and always losing to Norwegians, Finns or Russians in international competition. Indeed, no American has ever finished better than 15th in Olympic races. All that may soon change. In rising numbers and with new seriousness, U.S. cross-country racers are preparing an assault on the 1976 Winter Olympics in Innsbruck, Austria.

Though the trappings of high-powered competition were not present at Putney, high-powered racers were. Topranked Bill Koch, who placed third in the 15-km. races at the European Junior Championships last year, won the 15 km., gliding through the familiar terrain near his family farm in Guilford, Vt. In the 50-km. ordeal, Tim Caldwell, a wiry young Olympic hopeful, won going away. And the country's top woman racer, Martha Rockwell, now has 15 individual national titles after winning the women's 5-, 10-and 20-km. contests.

Nordic Route. The wave of improved nordic racers reflects a new surge of participation in the sport. Turned off by the high cost of downhill equipment and lifts, not to mention the crowded conditions at most alpine ski resorts, many people are now going the nordic route. For full-time competitor as well as amateur, there is a price for the solitude they find along rural trails: hard work. Few sports are so demanding. On long, thin skis, cross-country skiers are like marathon runners covering miles of rugged terrain while burdened by pounds of awkward gear.

A lack of money is one reason why Americans have been slow to assault European dominance. Successful competitors in Europe earn as much as $50,000 a year from government salary, prizes and endorsements. In the U.S. a top performer is lucky to win a plane ticket and three meals a day. Says American Racer Ron Yeager: "Europeans are racing for dollars. Skiing is their only occupation. What are we racing for? Self-satisfaction, I guess."

Whatever their motivation, skiers competing for berths on the U.S. Olympic team have not ducked much pain lately. The program set up by the U.S. Ski Association, which organized competition in 1966 and has built training facilities in Utah, is brutal. Summer workouts begin with a 6-mile morning run, wood splitting, more running and then, after lunch, weight lifting. Lack of snow is no obstacle: training includes 15-mile slogs on roller skis--3-ft. skis with roller-skate wheels. If anyone slacks off, Coach Marty Hall drops him or her from the program. "We're not here to fool around," says Hall. That may be a promise of things to come at the Olympics next year.

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