The three came flying down the final hill, Diggins moving into second. He says her going gold isn’t the only exciting news now that their tiny town is in the worldwide spotlight.
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“It was a nail-biter all the way up to that finish line. I felt like she really deserved it”, said Diggins’ 11-year-old neighbor Amelia Brower.
This was something worth shouting about. Kikkan Randall and Jessie Diggins teamed up to win gold in the women’s sprint in a race where thrilling doesn’t seem like a strong enough word.
The medal is the first for a U.S. Olympic cross-country team since Vermont’s Bill Koch won a silver in 1976.
“To have it happen in a team event means so much more to me than any individual medal ever would”, Diggins told NBC after the win.
Randall’s plans to retire hinge on spending more time with her family, including her young son, Breck, who was born in 2016.
He then went from excitement to full-out, vocal-bruising screaming as Diggins made the final stretch and with each screeching “YES!” he almost blew a gasket.
Those 1,250 meters were the last of Randall’s Olympic career.
Sweden took silver and Norway finished with a bronze, which allowed Bjoergen to secure her record 14th medal in the Winter Games. They are the first women from the U.S.to ever medal in cross country skiing.
While Randall’s persistence was the story behind the medal, it was Diggins’ brilliance at the end that captured victory for the United States.
Mikaela Shiffrin now has two gold medals in two separate Olympics before the age of 23.
“It’s taken a lot of support. It’s a fairy tale”, Randall said.
Four years ago, Holly competed with Kikkan at the Sochi Olympics – where she cheered for her in pink suspenders. Doing so, Diggins also put her old stomping grounds in Minnesota on the map.
Diggins surged past and thrust her ski across the line 0.19 seconds ahead of Nilsson.
With the crowd roaring, Sweden’s Stina Nilsson leads USA skier Jessie Diggins by two lengths. The race, which is a type of relay, is 7.5 kilometers, or roughly 4.66 miles long. “But I feel darn close”. “But for me the biggest thing was seeing the team and knowing that Kikkan was waiting for me at the finish line. I know he’s in a good place so now I can focus on what I need to do”.
In addition to her athletic accomplishments, Randall has served as an active ambassador for youth through leadership engagement with both Healthy Futures and Fast and Female – organizations that promote the benefits of healthy, active lifestyles to youth.
Randall and Diggins stick to their rituals. The success the USA women cross-country skiers have had on the World Cup circuit the last five years just built up to this point.
Now I’ve written about the value of sports commentators before and how they can make a great moment become epic.
“I was really happy”.
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Mariama Jamanka won the women’s bobsled, giving Germany its fifth gold medal in eight sliding events so far at Pyeongchang.
