15 kilometres, Men

The shortest distance on the Olympic cross country skiing program was now reduced from 18 km. to 15 km., and for the first time in Olympic history the Nordic Combined participants were not taking part in the event concurrently. The Finns, who had taken all the medals at the 1954 World Championships with Veikko Hakulinen winning, was favored among most of the experts. But the defending champion from 1952, Hallgeir Brenden of Norway, was eager to revenge his disappointing 14th place in the 30 km. His form prior to Cortina had been in flux – at times he looked superb but a toe injury in December had slowed him and he had not won any of the Norwegian selection races. The Soviet skiers were considered better on the longer distances.

On a foggy and snowy day, Brenden starting first among the favourites, and took the lead after 5 km., 13 seconds ahead of Vladimir Kuzin with Sixten Jernberg one second behind Kuzin. Hakulinen was seventh, 25 seconds behind. During the following 5 km., Brenden increased his lead. At 10 km. he was 21 seconds ahead of Pavel Kolchin, who had advanced from fourth place at 5 km. Jernberg, still in contention for a medal, was nine seconds behind Kolchin, but Kuzin was obviously in trouble, falling back to fourth place.

At the finish, Soviet skier Nikolay Anikin, who started 18th, had the best time until Martin Stokken was able to take the lead. Brenden was able to keep his speed and finished with a time over one minute better than Stokken. Kolchin was able to stay ahead of Hakulinen and was in silver medal position, but Jernberg with his late start number of 56, had a good finish and secured his second silver medal, three seconds better than Kolchin.

Hallgeir Brenden, a 26-year-old lumberjack from Trysil, had defended his title, the first cross-country skier to do this at the Olympics. He was an outspoken and extremely popular man, and the picture of him with Italian movie star Sophia Loren on his knee went all over the world and contributed to his rising international fame.