Cross-Country Skiing-Ice-cool Klaebo takes team sprint gold for Norway, Sweden win women's race
TRONDHEIM, Norway :Norway's Johannes Hoesflot Klaebo anchored his team to victory in the team sprint classic on Wednesday to claim his fourth gold medal at the Nordic World Ski Championships, with Jonna Sundling and Maja Dahlqvist triumphing for Sweden in the women's race.
Finland took silver and Sweden the bronze in a frenetic finish to the men's race, while in the women's competition the United States secured the silver and Switzerland the bronze.
Teamed up with lead-off man Erik Valnes, Klaebo displayed all the dominance that has made him one of the sport's greats at the age of 28, thrilling the crowd on the final lap with a display of power and technique that none of the rest of the field could match.
Valnes played his part perfectly, consistently delivering comfortable leads for Klaebo to build on and they eventually won by a margin of just over four seconds, much to the delight of the estimated 20,000 Norwegian fans in attendance.
Klaebo cruised across the finish line oblivious to the frenetic battle raging behind him on the final straight between Finland, Sweden and Italy for second and third, with the Finns just edging out their Nordic neighbours by one-hundredth of a second to take the silver medal.
Skiing first of the pair, Sundling skied superbly for her three laps in the women's race before handing over a 5.4-second lead to Dahlqvist for the final lap, and though she was reined in by the chasing pack on her first two laps, she managed to hold on to the lead to win by a margin of 2.9 seconds.
There was a tight battle for the remaining podium places, with the American pairing of Jesse Diggins and Julia Kern securing the silver and Anja Weber and Nadine Faehndrich of Switzerland coming in third, almost 10 seconds behind the Swedes.
With a relay and a long-distance race remaining for each gender, Klaebo and Norway have taken all four gold medals in the men's events, while the Swedes have claimed victory in all four women's races.
