(Last updated March 10, 2012)
Billy missed the early January World Cup events as he waited for the arrival of their first child. On Wednesday, Jan 12, 2011 Billy's bride Katie delivered a baby boy, Liam (right). Billy wrote on Twitter: "well fatherhood has begun! Liam was born Wednesday night weighing in at 7lb 14oz! My beautiful wife is recovering well and we are three!" Bill rejoined the World Cup tour in Chaux Neuve.
The 2010-11 World Cup schedule was very sparse, with only 15 event compared to 27 in the 2011-12 season. To make room for the World Championships, the FIS left a string of five weekends open.
Bill finished the 2010-11 World Cup season in a tie with teammate Johnny Spillane with just 14 points. (Todd Lodwick led Team USA with 103 points, followed by Bryan Fletcher with 75.)
**Botulism is a rare (approximately 110 cases in the U.S. per year, the majority in infants) but serious illness caused by botulinus toxin, a very powerful toxin produced by the anerobic bacterium Clostridium botulinum which is common in Utah. The 2011-12 National Jumping and Nordic Combined Championships were again held in the summer on Plastic but were split, with the Large Hill event in Park City and the Normal hill jumping and the Nordic Combined Championship about a month later at the Norge Ski Club complex in Fox River Grove, Illinois. In the special jumping championships, Bill finished nineth on the Large Hill in Park City and third on the Normal Hill at Norge, and he scored his fifth career National Nordic Combined Championship at Norge. Between the two halves of the National Championships, five members of the NC team (Demong, Spillane, Bryan and Taylor Fletcher, and young Eric Lynch) traveled to Europe for some Summer Grand Prix competition. Bryan Fletcher led the team on the first day in Oberwiesenthal with an 8th place finish. The next day, Billy finished third in a new event. For a couple of years, FIS has sanctioned just one NC format, the Gundersen sprint, but now they tried a new format that they are calling a Penalty Race. You can read an explanation of the event, and much more, on Billy's blog.
Period I On Friday, Bryan Fletcher led the team, jumping on a windy day to eleventh but dropping back to 18th in the XC race. Billy jumping to 29th and moved up to 20th in XC. Magnus Krog (NOR) won the event. The winds were worse on Saturday, forcing cancellation of the jump and using Friday's provisional jumping round where Bryan notched 25th place and Billy 30th. They both moved up in XC, Billy finishing 19th and Bryan 20th. Tino Edelman (GER) was the winner. The second stop on the 2011-12 World Cup tour was Lillehammer where, for the second event in a row, the wind blew out Saturday's Nordic Combined jumping. In Friday's provisional jumping, used for Saturday's XC seeding, Bryan Fletcher jumped to 16th place, followed by Bill Demong in 28th, Taylor Fletcher 45th, and Johnny Spillane 50th. In the race, Bryan dropped back to finish in 31st place but Demong moved up to 25th, and Taylor Fletcher raced all the way up to 21st position post his best ever World Cup finish. Spillane also raced well, moving up to 35th place. Haavard Klemetsen (NOR) won the day. Sunday's event in Lillehammer was run in the new Penalty Race format.
(You can read an explanation of the event, and much more, on
Billy's blog.)
On Saturday, Dec. 10 in Ramsau, Austria, Billy finished 11th, his best World Cup finish since the 2009-2010 season, jumping to 14th place and moving up three spots in the XC race. Bryan Fletcher jumped to 22nd position and moved up one place in the race. Todd Lodwick joined the boys, bringing the top four together for the first time this season, and finished 29th. Johnny Spillane couldn't match his 12th place trial jump, dropping to 49th in the jump but racing back up to 37th. Jan Schmid (NOR) won the event over defending World Cup champion Jason Lamy Chappuis (FRA).
In Ramsau on Sunday, Todd Lodwick led the U.S. Team, jumping to 23rd place and holding that spot in the cross country race. Bill Demong jumped to 37th place but raced past eleven competitors to finish 26th. Bryan Fletcher teamed up with Demong in the race, moving up nine spots and finishing just out of the points in 31st, while Johnny Spillane suffered a very bad day, starting last and finishing last.
Defending World Cup champion Jason Lamy Chappuis (FRA) won the event in a tight sprint with Magnus Krog (NOR) and moved into first place in the standings by four points over Tino Edelmann (GER). The Dec 16-18 COC events scheduled for Lake Placid were cancelled and moved to mid-week in Park City, and the U.S. boys continued to turn in excellent performanences. On Tuesday, Dec 13, snow fell in the morning, making the jumping difficult, but the U.S. skiers used superior cross country speed to move up in the field. Taylor Fletcher turned in the fastest XC time of the afternoon as he stormed up from 23rd starting spot to finish second behind Mark Schlott (GER). Adam Loomis posted the fourth fastest time, racing up from 26th to finish sixth, by far his best COC finish. Nick Hendrickson (6th fastest) moved up from 27th to finish eighth and Brett Denney (third fastest) followed in 13th. Fletcher took over the lead in the FIS NC COC points race.
On Wednesday in Park City, the U.S. Team placed four in the top ten, led by Loomis who improved on his career best COC finish, jumping to 8th place and moving up in XC to 5th. Taylor Fletcher again turned in the top XC time as he moved up from 36th to finish 7th. He was followed by Brett Denney who moved from 31st to 8th with the second fastest XC time. Nick Hendrickson started 25th and finished 10th with the 6th fastest race time. Schlott won again and regained the lead in the points race, moving Fletcher to second. The World Cup continued on Friday, Dec 16, in Seefeld, Austria, with a sprint relay in which two competitors each ran a 7.5 km leg on a 1.5 km course. Bryan Fletcher teamed up with Bill Demong to finish sixth, while Todd Lodwick and Johnny Spillane finished 11th. France's Sebastien Lacroix and Jason Lamy Chappuis won a tight race over Italy and Norway. In Saturday's 10 km Gundersen event, Johnny Spillane jumped to 29th and moved up one minute to finish a season best 20th. Bryan Fletcher improved even more, from 40th to 23rd. Todd Lodwick moved up seven places to finish 39th. Bill Demong took part in official training and provisional jumping, but did not start in Saturday's competition. Go down two paragraphs to find out why. Jason Lamy Chappuis won the event, extending his lead in World Cup points.
On Sunday Bryan Fletcher jumped to 24th place but then stormed past 17 of his competitors to finish in a career-best 7th, just 10.2 seconds behind the winner, Jason Lamy Chappuis of France. Johnny Spillane raced up from 33rd start position to finish 22nd while Todd Lodwick moved up just one place from 29th to 28th.
Again, Billy's name was mysteriously absent from the start list, and NC Coach Dave Jarrett explained why. The FIS has added a qualifier to Nordic Combined weekends. Each weekend a provisional round of jumping is conducted, the points to be used to seed the cross country in case the Saturday jump is weathered out. This provisional round is also used as a qualifier and, as in special jumping, the top 50 jumpers in the provisional round qualify for the weekend's World Cup competition. On Friday, Billy placed 52nd, just three points from qualifying, so he had to watch the competition on Saturday and Sunday.
On Sunday in Oberstdorf, the boys were back to a standard Gundersen event. In the large hill jumping, Johnny, Billy and Bryan finished 20th, 22nd and 25th respectively with XC start times 1:23, 1:27 and 1:34. (Taylor Fletcher failed to qualify in the top 50 and so did not start the event.) The three U.S. skiers got together in a group of racers that grew to as large as 13 and pulled the bunch up through the field to as high as 35 seconds behind the leaders before the podium contenders put on the pressure and stretched out the gap by almost 15 seconds in the last couple of kilometers of the race. At the finish, it was Mikko Kokslien (NOR) winning with the U.S. boys in a block: Demong 14th, Spillane 15th and Bryan Fletcher 16th.
On Friday, Jan 13, Chaux-Neuve FRA, hosted a Gundersen event moved from Zakopane, and Bryan Fletcher had the jump of his life, placing second in jumping, just four tenths of a point behind the leader, Jason Lamy Chappuis of France. Bryan started the XC race just two seconds behind Chappuis. Something about the jump grouped the skiers in a clump on the results sheet. Bill Demong started 20th, just 37 seconds back. Johnny Spillane started 48 seconds back and Taylor Fletcher started at 54 sec. Nick Hendrickson joined the team and started at 1:33. With the skiers tightly grouped, a lead group developed and grew up to 13 skiers before it finally split. Bryan swapped between second and first spot while he and Chappuis towed the lead group around the course. After mid-race, Bill Demong was the last racer to join the lead group, but when the group split, he and Bryan found themselves in the trailing half, drifting back. In the end, Alessandro Pittin pulled away to win ahead of World Cup leader Chappuis. Demong finished 8th, Spillane 13th, Bryan 14th, Taylor Fletcher 25th and Nick Hendrickson 49th.
Saturday brought another Gundersen event with Spillane jumping to to 13th, Demong tied for 28th, Bryan Fletcher 41, Nick Hendrickson 48 and Taylor Fletcher 49. In the XC race, Spillane made up 70 seconds and Demong 1:30 as both of them joined the huge lead pack of 19 skiers. As the leaders pressed toward the finish, racers were shelled off the back. Johnny finished 9th, just 8 seconds from the gold and Billy finished 12th, 11 seconds out. The Fletcher brothers finished together in places 31 and 32, while young Nick Hendrickson finished 41st. Alessandro Pittin stormed up from 1:24 back to win a three-up sprint with Chappuis and Riessle to take his second event in a row.
The top three were identical to the Friday podium.
In Sunday's Gundersen event, Pittin started fourth, just ten seconds back and made his way to the front by the second interval, then blasted away from the competition and soloed to a 17 second victory, his third win in a row. Behind him, a chase group grew to as many as 14 racers running about half a minute back. The group included Johnny Spillane and Bill Demong, Who had started 20th and 21st, 1:02 and 1:03 back respectively. These two stayed with the big bunch as a few were shelled off the back. Demong finished sixth, 19.5 seconds back, with Spillane in eighth, 26.5 sec. behind the winner -- these were season best results for both skiers. Bryan Fletcher finished in 26th, just behind World Cup points leader Lamy Chappuis. Brother Taylor Fletcher finished in the 39th spot, followed by Nick Hendrickson in 49th.
During the break, a few of the World Cup competitors traveled to Klingenthal GER for a Continental Cup event. Taylor Fletcher joined B-Teamers Nick Hendrickson and Brett Denney in Klingenthal where he placed third and first in the two events. Hendrickson and Denney both place out of the points. See results for
Saturday or for
Sunday.
Saturday's event was a two-man team sprint where
Bryan Fletcher & Bill Demong formed USA-I, while USA-II consisted of Taylor Fletcher & Johnny Spillane. USA-I jumped well: Billy landed at 119.6 meters while Bryan flew to 127.5, placing them 5th, 36 seconds behind the jumping leaders, France-I (Maxime Laheurte & Jason Lamy Chappuis). Taylor Fletcher (115.5 m) and Spillane (121.5) started 13th, 70 seconds behind the leaders.
Coach Dave Jarrett wrote "Exciting race today, great jumping from all four guys. Both teams were in the hunt halfway through the race. Johnny is still recovering from sickness and didn't feel awesome but stayed tough. We had some trouble on a couple exchanges that allowed other teams to get ahead of us. Hopefully the organizers and the jury realize they made the exchange zone way too small to have 10 teams tagging at the same time. Billy was there at the end for the podium but couldn't quite match the short burst up the last hill and got dropped a bit. Still two in the top 10 is a good. We know we are putting ourselves in position to podium almost every weekend but haven't had things line up quite right yet. It is coming."
Dave was prophetic -- Sunday was a good day for the U.S. boys, with Billy on the podium in third place, Bryan following in 7th, brother Taylor 14th and a recovering Spillane in 19th. In the jumping, Bryan placed 9th, Billy 17th, Johnny 18th and Taylor 33rd. Akito Watabe (JAP), third in World Cup standings, started the XC race with a 20 second lead over Tino Edelmann (GER). Bryan Fletcher started 62 seconds back and Billy & Johnny farther back still at 1:22. At the second timing interval (2.5 km) the field had developed into Watabe with Gruber and Edelmann chasing, 45 seconds back, then Bieler solo at 1:09, followed by a group of 13 racers 1:20 back which included Bryan, Billy and Johnny. The big train caught Bieler and slowly nibbled away at the gap to the leader. Demong went to the front and caught the next two, passing through the sixth interval timer in second position. At the finish, Watabe's lead was down to just three seconds and Mikko Kokslien nipped Billy in the sprint for second place. Demong turned in the fasted XC time, Bryan finished 7th, ten seconds ahead of World Cup leader Lamy Chappuis of France. With the fifth fastest time, Taylor Fletcher made up over a minute, moving up from 33rd to finish 14th. A good day indeed!
The USA Boys were back in action on Feb 18-19 in Klingenthal (GER). On Saturday Johnny Spillane put down a good jump to place 11th but then faded badly in the XC race to end up back in 30th. Bryan Fletcher went from 14th after the jumping to 17th at the finish. Billy Demong moved up from 20th to 19th and Taylor Fletcher put in a good race to move from 31st after the jump to finish 23rd.
On Sunday Johnny again led the U.S. boys on the jump, placing 14th but sliding back to 24th after the race. Billy jumped to 20th but then put in the 5th fastest XC time to move up finish 10th. Bryan jumped to 19th and ran well to move up to 15th. Taylor started 39th after the jump and moved up to 29th. All four gained points on both days. Chappuis of France widened his World Cup lead with a second place and a first place.
Feb 25, Liberec, CZE. Bill Demong used the second fastest XC time in the field to move up from 38th start position to finish 14th. Bryan Fletcher finished 19th and brother Taylor Fletcher 32nd. Bernhard Gruber (AUT) started second and moved up for the win, while World Cup leader Jason Lamy Chappuis finished down in 21st spot.
On Sunday, Bryan Fletcher broke new ground, jumping to 6th, then racing up to 4th place, his new best World Cup finish.
Bill Demong jumped to 24th but got into a strong group in the XC race which worked up through the field -- Bill finished 8th. Taylor Fletcher finished 20th, Spillane 39th, Nick Hendrickson 44th and Brett Denney 47th. All six U.S. skiers moved up during the XC race. World Cup leader Jason Lamy Chappuis got back on his game after an off day on Saturday, finishing second to close the fourth period of the World Cup campaign.
Friday, Mar 9 -- The World Cup season closes with two events at Holmenkollen and on Friday, the event was a normal hill Gunderson competition. For their Normal Hill competition, the guys jumped on the newly rebuilt Midstubakken hill (HS-106) just below the fabled Holmenkollen jump. Akito Watabe (JAP) won the jump, then went on to win the XC race, leading wire to wire. Watabe started with a 20 second cushion, expanded it to 25-30 sec. for most of the race before letting up at the end to hold off the field. The Japanese skier has been on a tear and now challenges World Cup leader and defending champion Jason Lamy Chappuis (FRA) who has only a 72 point lead with one event to go -- Watabe earned 100 points for today's victory, so while the 2012 podium is set, the order is still to be determined.
Bryan Fletcher jumped very well, placing third. Bryan started 39 seconds behind the leader, Taihei Kato of Japan, and settled into a working group of three with Tino Edelmann (GER) and Gudmund Storlien (NOR). This group worked it's way closer and closer to the leader until just after the halfway point in the race, Fletcher blitzed away from the group of three and charged up to the leader. It took Bryan just a couple of kilometers to catch and pass Kato and take the lead. As this was going on up front, a second working group of 6 skiers including strong runners Bill Demong and Magnus Moen moved up from behind, pulling closer and closer to the leaders. In the end, Bryan managed to maintain his lead and won his first World Cup event, and what better place to break through than the Holmenkollen? Mikko Kokslien roared up from the Demong group and passed Kato for second, Kato held on for third and Billy won the finish sprint over Moen for fourth place. Johnny Spillane finished 15th. Taylor Fletcher did not qualify for the thirty man start list for the final event of the season. World Cup leader Jason Lamy Chappuis finished one spot behind points chaser Akito Watabe to protect his lead, so Chappuis won his second World Cup in a row. Tom Kelley of USSA reports "Billy left directly from Holmenkollen finish area to the airport to catch a night flight to Zurich. In the morning, he's skiing the Engadin Skimarathon!"
Table columns give the venue location and the date of the event, and in the right-hand columns, we will post Bill Demong's finish place, the World Cup points earned for that placing, link "US" to the USST news story and link "FIS" to the official FIS results page. That results page includes, in the upper-right corner, a list of available files including: jump results, World Cup standings, Nations Cup standings, money standings, start lists, etc. The USST article usually describes the weather conditions and how the race went for Bill and the rest of the U.S. World Cup competitors.
I hope you have better luck. DCW
Copyright © 2012, All Rights Reserved
|
