Differences in pacing of cross-country skiers by nationality - The example of Vasaloppet 2004-2017 It has already been observed that athletes dominate certain genital nationality certain sports;However, this phenomenon has been less explored in cross-country skiing, especially with regard to performance-related aspects, such as the pacing. The aim of the present study was to investigate the impact of nationality on the stimulation strategies of long runners who completed the ‘vasalauf’ from 2004 to 2017. We examined 183'919 finishers (19,465 women and 164'454 men), which in 15 nationalities, ie nationalities with number of finishers over 0.25% of the total number of finishers. For women, athletes were from Russia (7:47:46 h: min: s) the fastest and athletes from Denmark (10:01:03 H: min: S) the slowest. In men, athletes were from Russia (6:33:03 h: min: s) the fastest and athletes from Denmark (9:03:27 H: min: S) the slowest. For women and men, a small interaction between nationality and section times with respect to the speed was observed, whereby the Russians had a more uniform pacing compared to their slower competitors.
The conclusion was drawn that athletes from faster nations run a more uniform pace, which is attributable to the general trend of fast athletes at a more uniform pace. The work can be found under https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30260255/