Photo: Carl Sandin/Bildbyrån
Alfred Buskqvist will be joining Team Ramudden for the next season. After several years of competing in traditional cross-country skiing and winning medals at Rollerskiing World Cup and World Championships events, the Swedish skier will devote his career to long-distance skiing.
Alfred Buskqvist has now found the motivation to continue to fight for his ambitions with Team Ramudden. ProXCskiing talked to Buskqvist about how this change will affect his summer training, what he considers the most significant challenges, and the goals for next season.
A couple of weeks ago, ProXCSkiing published an article stating that sprinter Alfred Buskqvist had decided to turn to Ski Classics. After devoting his career to traditional cross-country skiing and having found success in rollerskiing events, the 26 years old skier will focus on long-distance ski events, racing for Team Ramudden.
The Swedish skier was interested in doing this career change and had contacted Team Ramudden for some time.
“Team Ramudden was one of the teams I was interested in. So, I called Gustaf Korsgren and asked about his thoughts,” says Alfred.
In an interview for ProXCskiing, Team Ramudden’s director Gustaf Korsgren said that having Alfred Buskqvist on the team would be interesting, especially because he could be a contender for the green bib.
Developing The Capacity To Double-Pole Over Long Courses
Buskqvist has been a strong performer on the Rollersiing World Cup and World Championships, but he will try to focus on training for Ski Classics this year.
“It would have been fun to compete in the Rollerski World Cup just like I did in the previous years, but I can not fit that into my plan now. But I will compete in rollerskiing long-distance events this year”, says Alfred, before explaining how summer training will be.
“I will spend the summer in Östersund (Sweden), where I live. It’s the perfect place for training, with many good skiers and conditions. I will have some training camps with Team Ramudden. But I will also spend some time in Tjörn. It might not be the skiing center, but you can’t spend the summer in a better place.”
Despite being young, Alfred has a long skiing experience. But he has not raced Ski Classics events many times. Now he is looking forward to participating in some of the most prestigious races.
“My favorite is Vasaloppet. It’s such a big event and a racecourse that I like. And it is extra fun because it’s a big happening for everybody in my ski club IK Stern.”
For the first season, Alfred will be looking to develop his double-poling capabilities and try to perform this technique over a long duration and uphill.
“My biggest challenge when I test long-distance skiing is being able to stand the full distance, especially uphill. This is the ability that I look forward to developing. I will train more hours this year than the previous year, and a big part of it will be double-poling, which means I will also try not to get injured. It will be fun to do a lot of long sessions this year.”
Alfred admits that it is hard to set goals for the first season. First, he will have to develop his double-poling and then start setting goals.
“But I hope my sprint training in the last years will help me fight for the green bib,” says Alfred.
More Strong And Young Athletes Fighting For The Green Bib
Every season, we see more athletes shifting from traditional cross-country skiing to long-distance ski races. Sprinters often decide to use their strength to compete for the green bib, one of the most desired bibs in the Ski Classics circuit. Next winter, Alfred Buskqvist will try to make that competition even more challenging.
But before that, Alfred will have to go through a long summer of training, do more double-poling and longer sessions than he used to, and spend some time developing this technique with his team.
Stay tuned to ProXCskiing.com to know what is happening during the silly season and get more knowledge about long-distance and traditional cross-country skiing.
