Musgrave Smashes the Lysebotn Opp Record – Power, W/kg and a New Standard for Uphill Skiing

In our pre-race build-up ahead of Lysebotn Opp, we speculated whether we would see a skier break 4.2 W/kg in double poling up Lysebotn. We honestly did not think it was possible, but Andrew Musgrave proved us wrong with a fantastic new course record of 31:02, which — within the margin of error in our calculations — comes very close to that magical value. On the women’s side, Astrid Øyre Slind did not quite match her time from last year, but still delivered an impressive 3.5 W/kg.

Skate vs double poling – shrinking gap and rising power standards

In the freestyle races we saw Heidi Weng and Simen Hegstad Krüger take the wins with 3.7 W/kg and 4.3 W/kg respectively. Skating is still faster than double poling, but the gap is shrinking. Slind’s and Musgrave’s times in double poling would have been enough for 5th and 6th place in the freestyle races.
We can also note that as many as eight men exceeded 4 W/kg and six women exceeded 3 W/kg in double poling — a significant increase in performance standard compared to just one year ago.

At Skisens, we are especially happy about the strong results from Team Ramudden Ski. Emilie Fleten took an excellent 2nd place just behind Øyre Slind, and Alfred Buskqvist delivered a very strong race, finishing as the second-fastest Swede in an impressive 12th place overall. The fastest Swede of the day was former Ramudden skier Johannes Eklöf, with a brilliant 3rd place.

Below you can see the top 10 skiers plotted against our current power profiles — profiles that, with this rapid development, we will soon have to revise…

PowerProfile