Swedish cross-country skier Frida Karlsson achieved a new success. She won the 20km classic mass start in Canmore (Canada) after sprint drama. Frida Karlsson’s time today is 57:08.2 min, followed by Kerttu Niskanen (Finland), who was 1.6 seconds behind. Third and fourth place went to Team Norway, won respectively by Heidi Weng on 8.1 sec and Astrid Oyre Slind on 8.4 sec.
For most of the race, the 24-year-old Frida Karlsson trailed the experienced Kerttu Niskanen, 35, when she made her winning move. Only 100m before the finish, she sprinted with unique dynamics, very quickly increased her lead and it was clear that Kerttu Niskanen had no chance anymore. It was Frida Karlsson’s second win of the season and 10th of her career.
Behind the battle for the title was the Norwegian duel between Heidi Weng and Astrid Oyre Slind for the third place. Heidi Weng emerged victorious and thus Astrid Oyre Slind had to accept that he would not step on the podium.
“It was a tough race. I noticed that many people were tired on the road, they had problems with normalizing their breathing. So I tried to continue on the slopes, keeping my rhythm as much as possible. It’s fun to ride when your body feels good”, said Frida Karlsson after the win.
The other Swedish cross-country skier, who has much stronger performances during the season – Ebba Andersson, got in trouble exactly on one of the last slopes. In the end, her ranking was 5th place, 13 sec behind the winner.
Jessie Diggins (USA) leads the World Cup standings with 2055 points, ahead of Lynn Swann (Sweden) who finished 9th today with 1731 points and today’s winner Frida Karlsson who has 1630 points.
