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By Lukas Sæther Pigott
During the Olympics it is very easy to get distracted and forget that you are a cross-country skiing fan. Bobsled, halfpipe, and short-track speedskating are just a few of the sports that can suck you in when you least expect it. Heated debates about curling strategy are extremely time consuming, and until now more or less futile.
However, I would suggest that the cross-country skiing world now has an even better reason to see who’s up to what in the other sports taking place in Italy.
With the odds of him becoming the most winning Winter Olympian of all time by next weekend becoming increasingly overwhelming, the Norwegian star Johannes Høsflot Klæbo is now in a place where we have to compare him up not up against other cross-country skiers of the past, but to athletes in other sports in hope of finding something that he isn’t winning at, or at least not dominating.
For instance his race against American alpine skier Mikaela Shiffrin for World Cup victories is tight, but he has found himself on the back foot with only 107 wins compared to her 108. In alpine skiing as well as many other sports, medals for the American men are the norm. In cross-country skiing, however, the medal ticker has been stuck at one, and it’s been stuck there for fifty years.
With Gus Schumacher getting a podium in a classic sprint in Goms two weekends ago, and Ben Ogden being one of the most stable classic sprinters, could today be the day that the counter advanced from one to two?
Klæbo didn’t become any less of a favorite after the qualification. Klæbo, cool, calm and collected as ever, put over two seconds into Ogden as he won the prologue. He was a staggering 5.5 seconds ahead of third place Jules Chappaz (France).
With start number 8, Ogden put almost three seconds into Harald Østberg Amundsen (Norway), who called the Vermonter’s run “scary”. This was just the start of a day for the history books.
An energetic Ogden told NRK that he was “pretty fired up” and that “it’s hard to hold back at the Olympics.” He would continue to show that throughout the day.
Zak Ketterson qualified in 23rd place, just ahead of JC Schoonmaker in 28th. The 11-second gap to Klæbo, huge for a sprint qualifier, illustrated just how fast Ogden and Klæbo skied around the course.
Gus Schumacher sat tied 29th with Slovenian Miha Šimenc before the young Spaniard Bernat Selles Gasch put on one of the performances of his life to make it two Spanish men in the heats. However it was Simone Dapra, the 28-year-old Italian who could drive to his birthplace Ospedale di Cavalese in the nearby village of Cavalese and back six times and still make his quarterfinal if he wanted to, who ultimately put Schumacher on the sideline for the rest of the day. Schumacher would finish the day tied with Šimenc for 31st, 0.14 seconds out of the heats.
“It feels weird to go from a podium to not qualifying” Schumacher told Nordic Insights as well as indicating that he felt good, so there likely was some trouble with the skis.
“it’s hard to say anything about ski speed when there’s no one around,” he mused. “But the result makes people think there was something going on.”
The first quarterfinal included two podium contenders in Erik Valnes (Norway) and Jules Chappaz, who both have struggled with sickness the past week. Klæbo won the heat as usual despite a near crash with Johan Häggström (Sweden) over the bump on the finishing straight. Häggström would be ranked as last for his efforts.
19 year old Swedish doublepoling phenomenon Alvar Myhlback joined Ogden in heat two along with home favorite and flagbearer for Italy in the opening ceremony Federico Pellegrino, who has four silver medals behind Klæbo from the last six championships.
“We’re both Madshus brothers, so we always stick together,” Ogden said about discussing tactics with Myhlback. “But you know, I told him that my plan was to go on the big hill, and he said that sounds good, and we got it done.”
On the long hill no one was able to keep up with Ogden, who ran up the hill and cruised into the finish. Behind him Pellegrino looked like he would secure a semifinal place on home turf, but just before the finish Myhlback came flying past on his skate skis with some mysterious grip wax allowing him to run up the final hill.
Unsurprisingly this turned out to be the fastest heat largely thanks to Ogden’s pace, meaning that Pellegrino and Lauri Vuorinen (Finland) could keep on racing.
While the course had been icy and fast for the qualifier, pushing the winning time down by 10 seconds compared to the winning time of the prologue on this course during the Tour de Ski earlier this year, it was expected to soften up throughout the day.
Unfortunately Ketterson found out what consequences the loose snow can have when his skis got caught in the snow, bringing him down at the bottom of the final hill in the fourth heat. Simone Moccelini gave the home crowd reason to cheer, winning the heat ahead of the young Czech Jiří Tuž.
“I was struggling with my skis from the qualifier,” Ketterson told Nordic Insights after the race. “I’ve had a million days in my career where my skis were awesome and I just performed badly, but it’s obviously lame when you feel like it’s the other way around.” As for his crash: “my klister just grabbed on that corner.”
In the final quarterfinal heat, Amundsen attacked the final hill from the bottom. Schoonmaker crested the hill in fourth and managed to close the gap to the others in the final part of the hill, critically getting the slipstream which allowed him to use the aerodynamic advantage and his doublepoling capabilities to advance to the semi finals along with Oskar Opstad Vike (Norway).
In the final quarterfinal Swedish Anton Grahn won the heat ahead of Simone Dapra, the only skier in the field who could take a nap in his own bed (albeit a short one), one kilometer down the road, before his semifinal.
In the first semifinal Klæbo took control with Ogden also at the front. In the skiathlon Klæbo had accelerated away from everyone on the final hill. Today he was matched and passed over the top by Ogden, with Klæbo glancing to his side to stare over at Ogden for a good few seconds.
After the race Klæbo told the NRK, slightly tongue in cheek, that he “just wanted to see how he looked.”
“He looked good,” was Klæbo’s conclusion.
Klæbo got the slipstream and used that to win the heat, while Vuorinen came from behind with an explosive sprint, pipping Ogden on the line with 0.04 seconds. Ogden would have to hope that his time was good enough.
Schoonmaker looked good in his semifinal, entering the final hill in fourth where Tuž attacked with Opstad Vike following and the two distancing the rest. Schoonmaker was strong over the top of the hill, but didn’t quite get onto the pair which meant he had to settle for fourth behind Vike, Tuž and Pellegrino. Neither Pellegrino nor Schoonmaker’s time was good enough for a place in the final, which meant Ogden and Valnes would get a chance to take home a medal.
“I was stoked to make the semi.” Schoonmaker told Nordic Insights. “Obviously, at the Olympics you always want to get a medal, but it’s like one of those things; only three people can do it. I gave it my all and just didn’t quite have the climb that some of these other guys had, but I’m really stoked with it.”
Who is going to win the final? came the final question as Schoonmaker’s interview wrapped up just in time to watch the last race of the day.
“Ben. Ben Ogden. I got all my chips on him. Let’s fucking go!”
Klæbo, Tuž, Vike, Vuorinen, Ogden, Valnes. Half of them would get a medal. One of them would get to stand on the top of the podium and have their national anthem played.
Already on the first little hill the podium was set. Klæbo, Ogden, and Vike separated themselves as the others struggled in the ever softer and more tiring conditions. As expected, nobody could do anything about Klæbo, but the big question was, Who would be the best of the rest? On the final hill, over the top and into the final straight we got the answer: Ben Ogden! He came to the line an unthreatened second, finishing 0.87 seconds back of Klæbo.
Behind him, Vike, with bronze secured, slowed down the homestretch to soak in the moment and wave to the crowd, finishing in a somewhat inflated time of 6.81 seconds back. Vuorinen, Tuž, and Valnes made up fourth through sixth in that order.
How is it to ski like this in the Olympics?
“It’s incredible,” said Ogden.
“It’s absolutely incredible.”
Ogden’s been known to have extremely fast qualifiers and quarterfinals before fading as the day goes on, but today things were different. Already in the heat selection he was more bullish than previously, going for the stronger second heat, instead of the fourth or fifth as he has done normally as well as not burning as much energy early in the heat.
“I’ve worked on my tactical game a little bit,” he told a group of reporters after the race. “Today I saved my moves for at least like a minute or two into the race, and I think that kind of made all the difference” was his answer to why things worked out today. “But also, you know, another four or five years of hard training.”
When a Swedish reporter asked when he realized that he had to change his tactical approach and commented that we’ve maybe been “wondering what he was doing,” which brought on some nervous laughter from the group of journalists, Ogden was clear that the question was justified.
“I mean, how many times have I toed the line in a semifinal or final with my heart rate pinned and my lactate in the triple digits?” he said, not really rhetorically. “I think today obviously I was feeling good and was happy with my fitness, but I also sort of paced myself a little bit and had a little gas for the final.”
No American male cross-country skier had taken an Olympic medal since Bill Koch’s silver medal in the Innsbruck Games in 1976. Ogden and Koch have in common that they are both from Vermont, and are proud of it. Now they have one more thing in common.
“It’s incredible. I’ve dreamed of being the one to bring home another Olympic medal for the Vermont cross-country ski community,” Ogden said after the race, “and here we are. I mean, it’s just unbelievable. And I can’t wait to see everybody from back home. I think that Vermont is such a place of hardworking and down-to-earth people, and I’m so so proud to represent the same way that Bill Koch did back in the day. So it’s just incredible.”
Ogden’s mom Andrea also talked to Nordic Insights about the ski community in Vermont.
“Well, starting at the top, Bill Koch makes it all seem possible. Bill Koch, Andy Newell, Kristina Joder, Sophie Caldwell. I know I’m forgetting someone. The number of Olympians that have come from our little neck of the woods is staggering. And I do believe Southern Vermont… it’s not Norway, and it’s not Minneapolis, but there’s something going on there. There’s an energy toward cross-country skiing that makes it all seem possible.”
Newell, who had watched the whole thing, also talked to Nordic Insights about this dynamic, saying, “It’s the great ski culture and it feels like one big family and Bill [Koch] is a huge part of that as is Sverre in Stratton. I’ve been skiing with Ben since he was probably ten years old and to see him do this today is really special.”
“I was never able to do it, but I was very confident that somebody from our club would be able to eventually, so it’s great to be here to share it.”
As has been his trademark recently, Klæbo saved his energy until the final hill, where he quickly distanced himself from the rest, a tactic that has gotten the stamp of approval from his family who say that they don’t want to have to be nervous until the finishing straight.
What did you think when Johannes just went off on the final hill?
“I think I feel like I blinked or blacked out or something for a couple seconds, and then he was just like off the front.” Ogden said. “I don’t even know, honestly, I think we got to the bottom of that hill and me and Oskar were side by side, and I was focusing on him, and he was probably focusing on me, and Johannes was just like doing some other sport.”
Are you surprised?
“For sure, I mean, it’s been a goal of mine for sure, but you know, part of sport is you fall short of your goals constantly. I believe that I was capable of it for sure, but yeah, I’m surprised.”
When asked what it was like to have so many people supporting him here he said, “Oh, it’s awesome. It’s such a pleasure. We rarely get to race in front of fans of ours, let alone ones that we know. And yeah, it was awesome and having the U.S. team stay after and give me a hug and cheer for me. I mean, it’s just incredible, and it just makes an awesome moment even more awesome.”
This win clearly means a lot for everyone supporting Ogden as well.
Have you been crying today? was the question put to USST head coach Matt Whitcomb.
“Yeah, quite a bit.”
What are some of the times when you were crying today?
“In the home stretch, even in the semifinal, thinking of what it might mean if Ben were to win a medal.”
“Knowing what he’s been through the last couple of years, really the last decade with his father’s illness and also knowing just like the kind of guy he is, that he’s just the best guy.”
“It felt like standing on the course in 2018 when Kikkan and Jesse won.”
What does this mean for American skiing?
“It’s not just Jessie Diggins who can do it. And Jessie will be the first person to tell you that. You know, she’s an incredible person, but she’s not bionic. She’s a human being made out of flesh and blood, just like the rest of us. And you see Ben do that today too, and Julia in 6th [in the women’s final], and JC [in the semis on the men’s side] skiing that way. These are flesh and blood, real people from our communities. And whether they’re from Vermont, Alaska, Idaho, Waltham, Massachusetts, anybody can do it. So that’s… it just gives me goosebumps thinking about that, thinking about my little boy self. Back in the day, believing also.”
What does it mean to see this happen now after everything that Ben has been through?
“Seeing him hug his mom after the race at the finish line there — that was really special. And it was impossible not to notice that his father wasn’t there. And his father was just like an older version of Ben Ogden.”
“You know, they are one in the same, and it’s all right. I mean, I feel it too. And I just felt John’s [Ogden] presence for a lot of this day, you know, right from the moment where we saw Ben skiing the qualifier, it was like he was on another planet. And those memories of his dad started to wash in, and he felt very present today in a weird sort of way. It feels good. “
How are you feeling?
“I’m feeling over the moon, yeah, over the moon,” Andrea Ogden told Nordic Insights.
“If you told me right now that this was all just a dream I would go, Okay, yeah I believe that. I can’t even believe it right now. He showed me the medal and I gave him a hug and he goes, Here, mama, look. And I was like, What’s this? What are you showing me?”
Andrea was of course a proud mom today — but moms are always proud of their kids.
Are you any prouder of him today than you were yesterday? she was asked.
“Wow, that’s a good question,” was her answer. “You know, what I would say is that I am so excited for Ben today. I don’t feel any more proud of him today than yesterday, to be perfectly honest. … So I think the answer is no. But I am so excited for him. Everything lined up. It doesn’t often happen in this world where, in your job, just everything falls into place. And he’s in a season where three of the four things fall into place. Kept knocking on that door. And I’m so, so excited for him.”
Back to Ben Ogden. After receiving his silver medal, he handed it to Klæbo who for the second time today looked over at him in slight disbelief. And backfliped off the podium.
[See this article from today for the full photo sequence of the backflip. Also hells yeah Anna Engel for the photos of this.]
“I promised my fifteen-year-old self that I would do that if I was ever on the Olympic podium, so I felt a little showboaty at the moment, but you know.”
After giving him back his medal, Klæbo, looking a little left out, did a 360° jump off the podium, while Vike went with waving his arms a little while half-jumping off the podium. But there was no need to wait for the technical and artistic judging panels to give their points.
Did you think he was going to do a backflip?
“No, before he did that backflip, somebody said to me, Do you think he’s gonna do a backflip?” Andrea Ogden told Nordic Insights “Uh-huh. I said, absolutely not. He’s so much more grown up now.”
“And then I looked over and watched him do the backflip.”
Racing continues in Val di Fiemme on Thursday with the women’s 10-kilometer interval-start skate. Jessie Diggins has a chance of taking home the one title she’s missing, individual Olympic gold, though the revelation that she is dealing with injured ribs from her fall in Saturday’s skiathlon may complicate her chances here.
You’re reading this on Nordic Insights, one man’s labor of love dedicated to publicizing American skiing. We started with nothing and now we’re at the Olympics. You can read more about our first three years here, and donate to the Olympics fund here. Thank you for consideration, and, especially, for reading.
