Finishing collection: how Alexander Bolshunov got in shape at the end of the season

Three-time Olympic champion Alexander Bolshunov won the 70 km freestyle mass start at the Russian Championships in Monchegorsk. The 28-year-old athlete covered the distance in 2 hours, 37 minutes, 17.1 seconds. The second was Egor Mitroshin, who lost 44.2 seconds to San Sanych. Ivan Yakimushkin took the third place (+45.1). A day earlier, Daria Kaneva won a sensational victory in the women's 50 km mass start. Elizaveta Pantrina finished second, Anastasia Kuleshova third. The ski season has ended at these starts.

Seventh victory in a row

After the multi-day "Big Wood Tournament", which became the final part of the Cup of Russia, most of the skiers went on vacation. Those who wanted to continue the competitive season stayed in the Murmansk region to compete for the last medals of the Russian championship. The men, led by Alexander Bolshunov, arrived in Monchegorsk, where they ran a 70 km speed skating marathon.

According to tradition, everything went smoothly during the first kilometers of the men's super marathon. The participants tried to stick to each other. At the 14 km cutoff, the top five formed: Ilya Semikov, Rifat Safiullin, Viktor Ivanov, Alexander Ivshin and Alexander Bolshunov. Our most decorated skier looked very confident at the start: clear sweeping movements and a minimum of fuss.

The turning point in the race occurred after the 62 km mark. Bolshunov beat Dmitry Kondrashov by 0.8 seconds and Andrey Kuznetsov by 3.2 seconds. It seemed that the fight would be tight until the finish, but San Sanych quickly broke away from his pursuers. With each cutoff, his advantage grew, and at the finish line he brought the competitors more than 40 seconds! By the end of the season, the three-time Olympic champion is in great shape, having won his seventh start in a row.

The fight for the remaining places on the podium turned out to be fierce, but in the end Egor Mitroshin came second, and Ivan Yakimushkin came third. It is worth noting that the marathon was skipped by the first and second numbers of the overall standings of the Cup of Russia Savely Korostelev and Sergey Ardashev. Of course, this does not diminish the significance of San Sanych's triumph, but still it was easier for him in the absence of the strongest competitors.

Mom is in the game

After Kirovsk, the women returned to Apatity, reaching a distance of 50 km. The composition there turned out to be very interesting. For example, Olympic champion Yulia Stupak, Olympic medalist Anastasia Kuleshova, as well as the opening of the 2024/25 season Arina Kalicheva took to the track.

At first, Ekaterina Smirnova led the peloton, followed by Lydia Gorbunova and Alisa Zhambalova. After the 10 km cutoff, the three looked even more confident, handing over the lead to each other. By 20 km, fewer than 30 athletes remained in the fight. Arina Kusurgasheva was already working as the first number, leading the others. The pace wasn't too high, all the tops stayed close. Then Gorbunova and Kuleshova decided to go to the ski changing pits. As a result, they lost time, and Irina Ibragimova came forward. After a few kilometers, all the race favorites returned to the head of the peloton.

Closer to the finish line, all the contenders for medals had already been determined, there were 13 of them, but in the end the final showdown happened between Khobotova, Kaneva, Lyashenko, Kuleshova, Kusurgasheva and Pantrina. This six crashed even before rolling out to the stadium. Kaneva secured the first place without much struggle, Pantrina came in second, and Kuleshova rounded out the top 3. Yulia Chepalova's daughter Olesya Lyashenko became the fifth.

One of the main sensations is the seventh position of biathlete Egorova. She left behind the titled Gorbunova and Stupak. Yulia, who missed most of this season, took ninth place in the marathon and said she had guaranteed herself a place in the national team for next season. "Guys! I ran half a mile! I'm the ninth, and I've qualified for the team! It's just called "mom in the game," the 30—year-old athlete wrote on social media.

After these races, our skiers need to start thinking about what to do next winter. To have a serious chance of Olympic medals, Russian skiers need to look at European tracks.

Special snow

Athletes themselves are well aware of the importance of adapting to the Olympic track. This season, some Russian skiers have held several training camps in Italy. Back in the fall, Sergey Volkov and Daria Nepryaeva trained in the Alps, and in February, before the Russian Championship, they, as well as Savely Korostelev and Alexander Bolshunov, again came to Val Di Fiemme, where the Games will be held.

Bolshunov stayed in Italy and for the first time in three years of suspension performed at international competitions, albeit a commercial one, at the start of the Sudtirol Moonlight Classic. The three-time Olympic champion won this start, but he did not have any total advantage over the amateurs.

Everyone has known for a long time that snow in Europe and Russia is different and needs to be adapted to it. Olympic medalist Alexander Panzhinsky explained in detail why this difference exists in a conversation with Sports.

"Usually, a pillow of artificial snow is placed on a natural base, which is shot with cannons," said the vice—champion of the 2010 Games. "The temperature in Europe is often minus at night, and plus during the day. Accordingly, the snow melts during the day and freezes at night. All this is mixed with an artificial base, ground with a ratchet, and an ice crumb is obtained. When it comes into contact with the plastic surface of the ski, there is less friction, and thus speeds are much higher than on natural snow. In Russia, most of the year they compete in the northern regions, where the snow is natural, plus there are often severe frosts. Such snow has a different structure, sliding on it is slow, we call it blunt."

It is difficult to find similar fast snow in our country in winter. Veronika Stepanova claims that there is one in her native Kamchatka, Panzhinsky talks about Krasnogorsk, where the weather resembles European weather. However, there is not always enough snow in the Moscow region, as it was last winter. In the same places where all the main Russian competitions took place this season, the snow was mostly "blunt": the Top of Thea in Khakassia, Chusovaya in the Perm Region, Kazan, Izhevsk, Syktyvkar and Kirovsk in the Murmansk region.