2026 Olympics : sixth Olympic title for Johannes Hoesflot Klæbo
It was expected, and the Norwegian media didn’t make a big deal of it. Johannes Hoesflot Klæbo won the skiathlon at the 2026 Olympic Games in Milan/Cortina on Sunday 8 February in Tesero (Italy).
After staying at the front throughout the race, taking advantage of the failures, mistakes and crashes of his rivals, he finally accelerated on the final climb of the course. Nobody saw him again, not French riders Mathis Desloges(2nd) and Hugo Lapalus (5th), nor his compatriot Martin Loewstroem Nyenget (3rd) or neutral athlete Saveliy Korostelev (4th).
“I was very nervous before the Olympics”, admits Johannes Hoesflot Klæbo
Yet the Olympic champion appeared relieved in the mixed zone. “I was very nervous going into these Olympic Games. I could tell just by my resting heart rate,” he told NRK. This apprehension disappeared during the race, as he confirmed to France 3 : “Once I got into the race, I felt fine. There were five of us fighting for the podium, and I enjoyed the battle against the French.
This gold medal is already his sixth at the Olympic Games. At the age of 29, Johannes Hoesflot Klæbo – who “feels good on this track” – can still envisage achieving a grand slam, like he did at the World Championships in Trondheim (Norway) a year earlier. He has already been reminded of this possibility by the media. ” It’s a good start, but I’m going to improve race by race,” he told France 3. He went on to tell TV2 : “It’s really important to have won gold in the distance so early in this competition. Now I can turn the page, relax and enjoy the next two weeks.
- Cross-country skiing: Mathis Desloges a splendid second in the skiathlon, a triumph for Johannes Hoesflot Klæbo
- Cross-country skiing: 15 minutes before his silver medal, the moment when Mathis Desloges could have lost everything in the skiathlon
- Cross-country skiing | “It’s just crazy”: the emotion of Mathis Desloges in silver in the skiathlon
- Cross-country skiing: photo album and video of the fabulous silver medal won by Mathis Desloges in the skiathlon
- Cross-country skiing: Mathis Desloges becomes France’s second individual Olympic medallist, the first in distance
- “I didn’t manage to get the finish I wanted”: the frustration of Hugo Lapalus, fifth in the Olympic skiathlon
- Cross-country skiing: what happened between Norway’s Harald Oestberg Amundsen and Russia’s Saveliy Korostelev?
- Cross-country skiing: the medals table and the full list of winners at the Milan/Cortina 2026 Olympic Games
