Home favourite Wigger makes it two golds from two in cross-country skiing

The home favourite delivered another dominant display to win the women’s sprint free on a chilly and windy day. She finished ahead of Anna Heggen (NOR) and Maerta Rosenberg (SWE), who is now also a double medallist at the Lausanne 2020 Winter Youth Olympic Games.

The trio capitalised on the final’s dramatic start, when on the tight and fast first downhill turn two skiers tumbled, taking cross free bronze medallist Tove Ericsson (SWE) out of the running.

Wigger was embraced by cheering friends at the finish line.

“It’s incredible that I could win today too,” she said, having also won the cross free gold on Saturday. “I just felt like I had a lot of energy left on the last lap so I pushed really hard and was able to get a little bit of a gap. I’m feeling really confident but we have another race to go [the 5km classic on Tuesday] so not too much celebration for now.”

The race’s early crash also helped Heggen. The Norwegian said: “That was a good thing for me [because] then we got some space and could race. Not so many people on the track and it’s not that much chaos.

“I was just trying to hang with Siri. I’m not so fast at the start but I had a good last lap. I didn’t realise [the result] until I had crossed the finish line but it was very fun. I had very high speed into the last metres of the race.”

Sweden’s Rosenberg said: “I’ve been so nervous the whole day. I’m just happy it’s over.”

In the men’s sprint free, Edvin Anger (SWE) won gold, while Norwegian twins Nikolai and Aleksander Holmboe took silver and bronze respectively.

Anger, who was second-best in the cross free, said: “It feels really good to go from silver yesterday to gold today. But it was a really hard, long day. You must know how to relax [in between].

“I went for gold from the start [of the final]. After the tough hill I just went maximum. I'm better for the sprint so I was looking forward to this race but it’s nice to relax tomorrow.”

Nikolai Holmboe, who won gold in Saturday’s cross free, said: “The final, everyone went fast so it was hard in the last hill. Edvin was strong today and I couldn’t beat him.”