New Hampshire will be well represented on the US Ski Team that is headed to Sochi in February. Today three Granite Staters learned that they have earned a ticket to the Olympic games.
Andover cross-country skier Kris Freeman will appear in his 4th Olympic Games. It will be the second Olympic appearance for Lebanon ski jumper Nick Alexander, and the first for jumper Nick Fairall of Andover.
Freeman is ranked second in the country for long-distance events, and the top three distance skiers will head to Sochi. Over his more than a decade-long career he has been a regular on the World Cup, and for several years was part of the “red group” or the top 30 in the world rankings. Freeman lost his spot on the four-man US team last spring after two years of declining results. The team will take seven men and seven women to compete in distance, sprint and relay events in the Olympics.
Fully half of the US men’s Olympic ski jumping team will be from New Hampshire. Of the two Nicks, only Fairall has scored World Cup points by placing in the top 30 on the international stage, though it’s only his first games. A third aspiring Olympic jumper, 24-year-old Christopher Lamb from Andover, did not make the cut.
The games begin on February 8th, and the men’s jumping event will take place on the 8th and 9th, and 14th through 17th. Cross Country races will take place all during the two weeks of the games.
