Koons, a Snow Farm ski instructor who is based in the United States, said yesterday he was confident he could reduce his FIS points average to the required 100 points in just one more race before team nominations are made December.
"At the moment, my average is 100.47, which is fine. I am in a great position and feeling pretty confident about qualifying. I am still pretty happy with the races. Really happy, actually."
Koons finished 18th out of 41 entrants yesterday, with the Canadians again dominating both men's and women's FIS events.
Canadians Ivan Babikov (30), Devon Kershaw (26) and George Grey (29) won gold, silver and bronze, respectively.
Babikov finished the men's race in 23min 8.24sec, just 5sec faster than Kershaw and 35sec faster than Grey, while Koons was about 2min 30sec off the medal pace.
In the women's 5km freestyle race the gold, silver and bronze went to Sara Renner (33), Perianne Jones (24) and Brittany Webster (22).
New Zealand's Katie Calder (28) and Samantha Bondarenko (24) scratched, leaving Andrea Fancy (28), Sarah Murphy (21) and Samantha Williamson (19) to fly the Kiwi flag.
They finished 7th, 10th and 14th respectively, in a field of 14.
Koons said the calibre of athletes in Wanaka for the cross-country skiing was as high as any he had encountered at FIS races overseas, and he felt the racing was well organised.
In the US, there would be more spectators, especially at the crowd-pleasing sprints, because snow fell to town level and races could be held closer to the people, he said.
"It [the Winter Games] is a step in the right direction. It takes time. It is getting there. In 2005-06 I was the only New Zealand athlete. Now there are five high-calibre elite-level athletes and more juniors," Koons said.
Andrew Pohl (20), of Dunedin, was the second New Zealander home, in 21st place, and Nat Anglem (36), of Christchurch, was third home in 25th place.
Pohl, who is based in Canada, raced hard yesterday, finishing 10 seconds behind Koons and earning 108 FIS points.
He was spent at the finish and had to lie down briefly but was soon back on his feet, happily rejoicing in his near-qualifying result despite the near white-out conditions caused by falling snow.
Anglem was also pleased with his race. He had a personal best in the 15km classic race on Sunday, despite breaking a ski binding, and felt he skied reasonably well again yesterday in his stronger discipline of freestyle, to obtain 137 FIS points.
"I would liked to have skied faster but I could definitely not have skier any harder," Anglem said.
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