Pair pull off upset for first U.S. women’s cross-country gold
Women’s victory a first in sport for America
PYEONGCHANG, South Korea — A team of two American women ended one of the longest droughts in U.S. Olympic sports on Wednesday.
Kikkan Randall and Jessie Diggins won the women’s team sprint freestyle race at the Pyeongchang Games, outsprinting more heralded teams from Sweden and Norway to become the first Americans to win an Olympic gold medal in cross-country skiing.
They are the first American cross-country skiers to medal at the Olympics since Bill Koch took home a silver in 1976.
“Hearing it out loud, it still doesn’t feel real,” said Randall, a five-time Olympian. “It’s what I’ve been working on for 20 years and with this team for the last five years and, wow, it’s just so fun to put it together tonight, finally.”
The win was especially sweet U.S. women’s bobsled team happy with silver medal. for Diggins. She had finished in the top six in each of her four Olympic events before the sprint relay, and missed a medal in the 10-kilometer freestyle last week by 3.3 seconds.
She came into Wednesday’s race undeterred, saying she would not have hung around the games if she had lost her hope of winning a medal. Then, under the lights on a chilly but calm night at Alpensia Cross-Country Skiing Center, Diggins came off the final hill in third place on this winding up-and-down track and took a massive risk — gambling on the widest of turns at nearly 30 mph, she momentarily drifted outside the track to create the space she needed to dart ahead of Maiken Falla of Norway.
In the final straightaway, Dig-