The Swiss Dario Cologna has achieved the historic hat-trick and was the first to win three Olympic cross-country skiing gold medals in series over the same course.
The 31-year-old triumphed over 15 km in Pyeongchang as he did in 2010 and 2014, for “Super-Dario” it was the fourth Olympic victory overall.
In the freestyle race against the clock, Cologna won after 33:43.9 minutes with an 18.3-second lead over the Norwegian Simen Hegstad Krüger, who had won the skiathlon at the start. Eight years ago in Vancouver, Cologna had also triumphed in free style, and four years ago in Sochi, the 15 km race was a classic race.
The bronze medal was won by Denis Spizow (+23.0) for the Olympic athletes from Russia on Friday. As the best German Lucas Bögl (Gaißach) finished in a good 15th place. I think I delivered well, even though I had some difficulties in between,”said Bögl.
Even in the second race, the fastest German man surprisingly outperformed the best German woman – Victoria Carl hadn’t made it to 19th place the day before.
Andreas Katz (Baiersbronn) finished in 25th place, Sebastian Eisenlauer (Sonthofen) did not exceed 32nd place two days before the relay race of 4×10 km.”Today there was a lack of liveliness and lightness, which are not good conditions for such a race”, Eisenlauer said.
Jonas Dobler (Traunstein), who was scheduled to be the fourth German starter, had been spared a bit of punishment as a precautionary measure with regard to the relay on Sunday. Thomas Bing (Dermbach), who was eleventh in the ski athlon, was also ordered to rest for the team decision.
Tobias Angerer won the so far only German Olympic medal for 15 km in 2006 in Turin with a bronze medal. Four years ago in Sochi Axel Teichmann had finished eighth.