American skiers continue to notch top 10s at World Championships

American nordic skiers continue to notch top-10 finishes at the World Championships in Trondheim, Norway this week.

On Thursday, the relay team of Alaska's JC Schoonmaker, Zak Ketterson, Kevin Bolger, and Ben Ogden finished seventh in the 4x7.5K relay.

Winds that reached 65 mph forced the event to be delayed for two hours and left the course a bit littered. The U.S. time of 1 hour, 9 minutes, 16.7 seconds was a bit more than a minute behind the winning team from Norway.

"Today was pretty good," Schoonmaker said in a comment distributed by U.S. Ski and Snowboard. "It was a bit hectic but it was mostly fun with the 7.5k loop. The crowd was amazing today though, it really fires me up and makes me race harder which is pretty cool. But the course was super dirty because of the wind, with all of the debris, and that was a big thing today for our wax techs, was to find something that wasn’t going to pick up all of the leaves, dirt, and debris in the tracks."

The women’s relay is set to run Friday as the Team Sprint at 4 a.m. AKST.

Wednesday was a big day for the Americans.

The duo of Jessie Diggins and Julia Kern finished in second place to earn silver in the classic event.

It was only the second-ever World Championships medal for the U.S. in a classic event. The first came in 2017 when Diggins and Alaska’s Sadie Bjornsen took bronze in Lahti, Finland.

Their time of 20:54:53 was just three seconds off Sweden’s winning pace.

"I also have to say I am so proud of Julia," said Diggins. "I have been training with her for ten years and seeing her skiing like a boss out there was so cool. It’s so cool to see how much work she has put in and overcoming all of these challenges — it’s not easy, but she makes it look easy."

The men’s team and all-Alaska duo of Schoonmaker and Gus Schumacher finished sixth in the same event in a time of 18:40:01.

On Tuesday, Schumacher finished 13th in the 10K classic race, while teammate and fellow APU skier Zanden McMullen placed 40th. Rosie Brennan, also an APU athlete, placed 22nd in the women’s race.

"I wanted more — I know in this race, and every race I’ve done, that a podium is possible," Schumacher said. "I want more but I am incredibly grateful to have a body that can take some adverse conditions and come up with 13th."

Worlds wrap up over the weekend with the men’s 50K on Saturday at 1:30 a.m. AKST and the women’s race is scheduled for 1:30 a.m. on Sunday.

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