15 kilometres (Freestyle), Men

For the third consecutive Olympics, 31 years old Dario Cologna secured the gold for Switzerland in the men’s 15 km. making him the first male cross-country skier to win the Tour de Ski and an individual Olympic gold medal in the same season. While the Norwegians dominated with a clean sweep in the first cross-country event, the 30 km skiathlon, the gold medalist Simen Hegstad Krüger, had to settle for second place in the 15 km. The other two Norwegian medalists in the skiathlon, Martin Johnsrud Sundby and Hans Christer Holund went home empty handed after placing fourth and sixth, respectively, in the 15 km.

At these Games, the 15 km event was the only men’s cross-country event in which skiers started at 30 second intervals, and was, this time, run in the freestyle technique. After a cautious start, Cologna took the lead at the 6.0 km mark and remained in the lead until the end of the race. He gradually extended his margin to 18.3 sec at the finish line. A fierce struggle for the silver and bronze medals took place behind him. In the first phase of the race, French veteran Maurice Manificat set the fastest pace, holding on to second place until the 9.8 km mark, but eventually dropped to fifth place. Also, Holund and Sundby were in the top three at different stages of the race. But the actual medal winners Krüger and Russian newcomer, and dark horse, Denis Spitsov, came from behind. Krüger was amongst the leading three for the first time at the 9.8 km mark while Spitsov was still in fifth place at the last split time at 13.5 km. After competing just one World Cup season, the Russian’s bronze medal was quite a remarkable achievement, although he had won an Under-23 World title earlier in the year.

The first finisher on the leader board was Switzerland’s Roman Furger, setting the mark as an early starter with number 20, before eventually ending up on 12th place. Due to the sequence of the numbers, Spitsov later clocked the fastest time, but within minutes, was out-performed by Krüger and Cologna. The latter was one of the favorites at the start and had the advantage of being in control of the race and also being aware of the split times of his opponents.

Norway’s top man for the short distances, and already decorated with the gold in the sprint, Johannes Høsflot Klæbo was not in this race. He was given a break in view of the prestigious relay scheduled for two days after the 15 km. Depression spread among the Swedish cross-country skiers after suffering another bitter defeat. They didn’t come anywhere near the medals, with their best runner, Marcus Hellner doing no better than eighth. There was disappointment also for the 2017 50 km world champion, Canada’s Alex Harvey who, after another good race, could only finish seventh, 35 seconds behind Cologna. After five World Championships medals, he went home from his third Olympic Games without a medal.