Para cross-country skiing: Karl Tabouret is world champion
And suddenly, he entered a new dimension. On Wednesday lunchtime, by the time he competed in and won the final of the classic standing sprint at the Para-Cross-Country World Championships in Trondheim (Norway), Karl Tabouret from Savoie had shattered all glass ceilings.
Having already scored his first World Cup podium this season and won his first world medal, the 21-year-old went one better by becoming world champion on the legendary Granåsen stadium tracks.
“I wasn’t feeling very serene before the semi-final because I had a few pains in my stomach and shoulders. But I went at it as usual, like a real brute (sic), to put in the best possible performance,” he tells Nordic Magazine.
If he finishes second in this heat, Karl Tabouret will have no problem reaching the final. In the final, thanks to a clever calculation between his handicap percentage and his qualifying time, the Frenchman started 14 seconds behind Japan’s Taiki Kawayoke, favourite for the title.
A victory won on the wire
“I disconnected everything and it was the mental side that took over, so I had to pull myself out until I was completely drained, he says. When I was pulling him up in the stadium, I was telling myself that I was this close to winning the gold medal! I threw everything at him and passed him.”
It was in the final straight that Karl Tabouret got the better of his opponent to give himself an immense and intense moment of happiness.
“I’ve got stars in my eyes, he admits, even though he’s been caught up in an unusual media marathon since his victory. I really wasn’t expecting it, I thought I was going to come second or third. At no point did I really think I was going to come first! For me, it was still too far away, I didn’t think I was going to make it.”
Although he has already indicated that he is aware of the scope of his achievement, Karl Tabouret will no doubt be getting another adrenalin rush this Wednesday evening when he receives his gold medal in the medals square in Trondheim city centre. Especially as the podium is shared with his team-mate and mentor Benjamin Daviet, who has a tan.
- The full programme for the cross-country skiing, Nordic combined and ski jumping world championships in Trondheim, the highlight of the 2024/2025 season
- Organisers of the Trondheim 2025 World Championships add a classic para-cross-country sprint to their programme
- Para-cross-country skiing: the French selection for the world championships in Trondheim
- “They’re taking a step forward”: what the French team thinks of the scheduling of a disabled sprint classic during the Trondheim Worlds
- Trondheim: Karl Tabouret, third, and Benjamin Daviet, ninth, qualify for the semi-finals of the classic sprint
- Trondheim: Benjamin Daviet and Karl Tabouret in the final of the classic sprint at the Worlds
- Trondheim: Karl Tabouret world champion in the classic sprint, Benjamin Daviet in bronze
- “It’s my first medal in a real classic, it’s huge”: Benjamin Daviet has a smile on his face after the classic sprint in Trondheim
