Fantasy Nordic

So, you think you're a nordic skiing fan. I mean, you read FasterSkier, maybe even Team Today, so you're pretty much an expert, right? You know Tobias Angerer won the World Cup. You know Petter Northug isn't going to lose a relay finish for the next 20 years. You know that Andy Newell is the first American to lead the FIS sprint points ranking in... forever.

Sure. You read the headlines. But...

1) Who scored more World Cup points last year, Torin Koos or Toby Fredrickson?
2) Tobias Angerer scored (a) 30% (b) 60% (c) 90% more points than 2nd place overall.
3) Which of the following skiers didn't win a World Cup Race: (a) Renato Pasini (b) Ole Einar Bjorndalen (c) Ola Vigen Hattestad (d) Tor Arne Hetland

Answers below.

Ok. At this point the cyclocross crowd should have stopped reading. The casual nordic crowd, too. But you -- you sick freak -- you're probably wondering if I counted Bjorndalen's 15k skate victory at World Champs as a World Cup win for question 3.

I didn't. And it was Lars Berger... don't just lump all the biathletes together, jeez.

Anyway, you're a hardcore fan of nordic skiing. Me too. But it's the 2000's. Can you really call yourself a fan of something if you don't play the fantasy version of it? Come on now. At this point I'd bet your mom is playing Fantasy Football. I'm pretty sure I saw "Fantasy Tour de France" on Yahoo this year.

So you don't play Fantasy Nordic World Cup. You're not a fan -- hate to break it to you.

"But Colin," you say, "there is no such thing as Fantasy Nordic! I love the internet, I'd play it if it existed, I want Marit Bjoergen on my team soooo bad, but it Just. Doesn't. Exist."

That's where you're wrong, good buddy. Because it does now.

If you know me, then you might know that I have a programming problem. Fantasy nordic actually predates crossresults.com by three years -- I ran a single league with 5 players, then 9 players, then 12 players the last three years. But now, it's time to up the ante. This year, it's open to the world.

Actually, hang on a second. I'm a guy with a day job and a web host that costs $8/month. If the "world" did get a whiff of something this nerdtastic, I couldn't possibly handle it.

What I'm really going to do is a public beta. The website worked great last winter with 12 users and 1 league. This year I want to try with up to 40 users and up to 6 leagues -- enough that I can make sure everything works with multiple leagues running concurrently, and multiple users on the site at the same time. Problem is, I don't have 40 friends who are into nordic skiing. I might not even have 40 friends total.

But that's where you come in, blog-reader!

So if you're stoked to worry about things like "should I trade Seriana Mischol and Sara Renner for Jens Filbrich?" go make an account. That will get you on the mailing list, which will keep you informed on when things are getting started (probably about November 15). If you have a bunch of nordic nerds friends you want to play with, that's even better. You can make a league, give it a password and only they can join. There's a bunch of other information on site, like how it actually works -- if your reaction to the phrase "Fantasy Nordic" is "whoa, that might be fun" go check it out.

If you reaction is "Colin is an even bigger nerd than I thought, and all I do is ride bikes," well, I tried to make you stop reading earlier.

So join me, in the rapture that is talking smack to someone because they overpaid for Vassili Rotchev (overhyped), Matty Fredriksson (over the hill), or any Norweigan sprint specialist.

The only rule is that you have to take the word "Beta" seriously here. Stuff is going to break. You must keep your e-composure no matter how badly you get screwed by my poor programming.

Answers:
1)Torin Koos
2) (C)
3) (D)