Alaska athletes continue the Olympic tradition

• Kikkan Randall, the phenom since birth.

• Callan Chythlook-Sifsof, the first Alaska Native to make an Olympic team.

• Jay Hakkinen and Jeremy Teela, the backbone of the U.S. biathlon team for more than a decade.

• Holly Brooks, the coach who became a contender.

• Kerry Weiland, the girl who shined even when playing against boys.

• James Southam, the late-bloomer headed to his second Olympics.

Depending on how they skate, ski and snowboard in the coming 16 days, the rest of the world may marvel at their magnificence, too. While it isn't the biggest contingent of Alaskans to go to the Olympics -- 11 competed in Italy in 2006 and 10 competed in Salt Lake City in 2002 -- it could be the one with the greatest expectations.

Four of the seven -- Weiland, Randall, Teela and Chythlook-Sifsof -- have climbed the victory podium at the World Championships or in World Cup events. A fifth, Hakkinen, came excruciatingly close to a medal four years ago in Turin.

Alaskans have a long and rich tradition of both participation and success at the Winter Olympics. From the 1972 Games in Sapporo, Japan, to the current ones in Vancouver, British Columbia, more than 60 Alaskans have earned the right to call themselves Winter Olympians. And for a decade or so before 1972, the biathlon team was loaded with soldier-athletes based at Fort Richardson.

Alaska makes up 0.23 percent of the U.S. population, but Team Alaska makes up 3 percent of the 216 U.S. athletes in Vancouver.

Athletes from one of country's least-populated states boast five Winter Olympics medals, including two in 1994 and 2006. Others have set the Olympic bar for other Americans, including Randall, whose ninth place in the 2006 sprint race was the best finish in history for American women, replacing the previous best, also established by an Alaskan -- Anchorage's Nina Kemppel, who had a 15th-place finish in 2002.

Given all that -- plus our proximity to Vancouver -- don't be surprised to see some Alaska flags waving at venues ranging from Whistler (cross country and biathlon) to Cypress Mountain (snowboardcross) to Vancouver (hockey).

"It's really one of the greatest honors that I'll have in my life," Chythlook-Sifsof said a Wednesday press conference in Vancouver. "I'm so incredibly proud to be representing my culture here."

The surest bet

Already it's been a great Olympics for the Alaskans. Southam tweeted about having breakfast with speedskating legend Bonnie Blair. Teela, a sharpshooter with a sharp wit, joked on his blog that "I feel very Olympic," borrowing the famous line from the movie "Cool Runnings," about the 1988 Jamaican bobsled team.

And Weiland, who almost made the 2006 hockey squad, reached a goal this week simply by clearing customs and picking up her credentials.

"I can finally say that I'm an Olympian," she told a representative from USA Hockey. "I'm definitely grateful for the long journey, and I wouldn't change anything."

Weiland, a longtime member of the U.S. women's hockey team from Palmer, is almost guaranteed a medal. Women's hockey has been contested at the Olympics since 1998, and the Americans have earned medals in 1998 (gold), 2002 (silver) and 2006 (bronze, when Pam Dreyer of Eagle River was a member of the team). Weiland already owns four world championship medals -- two golds and two silvers -- and it would be a huge upset for her and her teammates to leave Vancouver empty-handed.

Randall, a three-time Olympian from Anchorage, gives the United States a legitimate medal threat in cross-country skiing -- a practically unheard of thing in a sport owned by Europeans and Russians. Besides her ninth-place sprint finish in the 2006 Olympics, she earned a gold medal in a 2008 World Cup sprint race in Russia and captured silver at last season's World Championships.

Her promise landed her on the front page of The New York Times earlier this season and earned her a featured spot in Sports Illustrated's Olympic preview issue.

GUNS 'N BOARDS

Teela, a three-time Olympian from Anchorage, learned to shoot from his dad, a retired U.S. customs officer who is pretty handy with a firearm himself. At a sneak-preview World Cup biathlon race last year in Whistler -- where the Olympic events will be held -- Teela claimed a bronze medal in the men's 20-kilometer race.

Hakkinen, Alaska's second four-time Olympian (Kemppel was the first), missed bringing an Olympic medal home to Kasilof by the narrowest of margins four years ago. A split bullet -- one that hit half the target but failed to drop it -- meant 10th place instead of third in the men's 20-kilometer race in Turin, Italy.

Chythlook-Sifsof, of Yup'ik and Inupiaq descent, learned to snowboard in rural Alaska and moved to Girdwood while in grade school, grabbed a bronze medal in her World Cup snowboardcross debut in 2007.

At the recent Winter X Games, she qualified for the six-woman finals and, although she didn't win a medal, she made the highlights with a spectacular wipeout that is common in the wild sport where snowboarding meets motocross.

Personal expectations

As for Brooks and Southam, both are still waiting for big international breakthroughs, although Brooks made an admirable World Cup debut last week.

Brooks scored World Cup points in two consecutive races in Canmore, Alberta, showing that the U.S. Ski Team was wise to make her a late addition to the Olympic team.

And even if she doesn't gain worldwide fame with a medal in Vancouver, few can match her story: Brooks works full time as a ski coach for the Alaska Pacific University nordic program, which boasts Randall and Southam among its members. She has been racing seriously for less than a year.

Though she took three weeks off this season to race in Canada and the Lower 48 -- a trip that established her as an Olympic contender -- Brooks maintained her work schedule until getting named to the Olympic team late last month. One day at the U.S. Cross Country Championships in early January, Brooks earned a silver medal in the afternoon at Kincaid Park and coached a two-hour session that night at Hilltop.

Southam isn't being touted as a medal contender, but he's at the peak of his fitness and a veteran of big-time racing. A five-time national champion from Anchorage, he has competed in three World Championships and is in his second Olympics.

"I told the team coach after '06, this one's for experience; the next one's for real,'' Southam said. "I (am) going in with some high expectations."

Find Beth Bragg online at adn.com/contact/bbragg or call 257-4335.