Nordic combination: Nordic combination athletes fight against boredom

Ramsau am Dachstein is the perfect place for Nordic combined athletes to make history. The first World Cup for women took place here on December 18, 2020. Three years later, the first Compact Race for winter athletes was held here on Saturday.

The premiere exceeded all expectations: with a loss of skis, scrambles and falls, it was certainly the most spectacular race in what is still a young sport for women. But it was at least just as important that in the end there were athletes from eight different nations among the top twelve. And for the first time in a good 21 months (!) the winner wasn’t called Gyda Westvold Hansen. The Norwegian had previously won 13 World Cup races in a row and was just as dominant as her compatriot Jarl Magnus Riiber among the men.

Result lists with almost always the same winners, boring competitions, too few participating nations, especially among women – these were the decisive reasons why Kit McConnell, as sports director of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), criticized the “lack of attractiveness of the sport” across the board. As a result, the IOC not only denied the women combined athletes the hoped-for inclusion in the 2026 Olympic program, but also threatened to cancel the men’s competitions for the 2030 Winter Games.

Since then, the “kings of winter sports,” whose sport has been an Olympic sport since the first Winter Games in Chamonix in 1924, have been in turmoil. It began with protest actions by the athletes, who formed an X in the air with crossed ski poles before their competitions. It stands for “No eXception”. Nordic combined is the only sport in which there are no competitions for women at the Winter Olympics. This season, constructive modernization ideas are being added to the protest: rediscovered competition formats such as the mass start (first running, then jumping) and innovations for the outdated sport. The new Compact Race certainly has the most potential to eliminate the great boredom.

In contrast to the “normal format”, in which good ski jumpers like Hansen or Riiber can achieve unassailable leads for cross-country skiing, in the Compact Race the distances for the cross-country ski trail are already fixed in advance. The winner gets 6 seconds ahead of the runner-up. The gaps towards the back become smaller and smaller, so that the entire field is chasing the leader within a maximum of 90 seconds. This creates turbulent scenes in cross-country skiing like in Ramsau. »The Compact Race was an incredible hustle and bustle, everyone was in one place. First a French woman lost a ski in front of me and then skied across the field. Then I fell too,” said the German protagonist Nathalie Armbruster, describing the premiere.

At the finish line, the 17-year-old vice world champion was “vomiting” after her sixth place, while Norwegian Ida Marie Hagen celebrated her long-awaited first triumph over her compatriot Hansen. In the men’s category, too, Dominator Riiber, who had celebrated four victories in a row before the World Cup in Ramsau, had to admit defeat to the Austrian Johannes Lamparter. Johannes Rydzek came fourth as the best German.

The new competition format obviously brings a breath of fresh air to the traditional sport. Even if strong jumpers like Riiber are not enthusiastic and even talk about “distortion of competition”. The new format is “very run-heavy,” according to women’s national coach Florian Aichinger. But “very, very exciting on all levels,” added men’s head coach Eric Frenzel. The most successful Nordic winter athlete at world championships, who was still active until last season, wants above all to save the Olympic future of the traditional sport. In January, at the invitation of the IOC, he will travel to South Korea for the Youth Olympic Games and will also hold talks with chief critic Kit McConnell there.

Perhaps Eric Frenzel will then also address other new competition formats that exist in the ranks of combined athletes. For example, the single mixed race like in biathlon. Or the “cross combination”, a mixture of cross-country sprint and ski-cross on the trail. Depending on their performance in ski jumping, the combined athletes would then compete in heats of eight on a hilly and winding course. The best in each run qualify for the next round until the winner is determined after the finale. Spectacular action and falls would be guaranteed in such a format.

“The show effect would be great, such a race could also inspire younger people,” says former national coach Hermann Weinbuch, who is now responsible for the young Germans. In order to save his beloved sport, he is also prepared to compromise on the sporting fairness of the competitions: “We simply need more participants, more interest, more action.” As was the case with the Compact Race in Ramsau.