American's Cross Country result, one for the books

American Kikkan Randall reached the semifinals with two great races in the qualifying round and quarterfinals in the women's Cross Country Skiing Sprint event Wednesday.

Randall's eventual ninth-place finish is the best individual Olympic result for a U.S. women's cross country in the history of the sport, besting Nina Kemppel's 15th-place finish in the 30km classical race from Salt Lake in 2002.

Fellow Americans Wendy Kay Wagner and Minnesota's Lindsey Williams performed well in the qualifying round, but fell short of advancing to the quarterfinals. Williams' time in the 1.1 kilometer race was 7.83 seconds slower than the best time ? and just 2.24 seconds behind the 30th place qualifier.

Wagner did slightly better at 7.26 seconds behind the best time and 1.57 behind the qualifying time.

Randall advanced through the quarterfinals taking a strong second place behind Canada's Beckie Scott in the six-woman race. Scott was fastest of the 66 skiers in the qualifying round and continued to ski fast in the quarters.

The semifinals saw Randall and Scott facing Germany's Claudia Kuenzel who set a strong pace, winning the heat with Scott in close pursuit. Randall finished that heat more than 3.5 seconds behind the leaders.

Scott went on to take fourth place in the medal round, watching a less known Canadian take the gold.

Chandra Crawford upstaged two of her better-known countrywomen and pulled off an upset in the sprint ? skating across the finish for Canada's first cross-country gold medal of the Turin Games.

Crawford, with tiny pigtails peeking out of her hat and a huge smile on her face, is hardly her country's biggest star -- previously staying out of the spotlight behind Beckie Scott and Sara Renner, silver medalists in the team sprint last Tuesday.

The 22-year-old Crawford edged silver medalist Claudia Kuenzel of Germany, while Russia's Alena Sidko took the bronze.

(Copyright 2005 by KARE. All Rights Reserved.)

Check out our KARE family of Web sites:
	takeKARE		Metromix
	Moms Like Me		Minnesota Bound
	Showcase Minnesota