The attention and focus of the Women’s contenders for todays 10km Pursuit in Free technique was challenged by having the competition start postponed twice. But in the end, the wait was worth and Frida Karlsson (SWE) headed out the startgate with a margin of 14 seconds to Therese Johaug.
The 33 year-old Norwegian was ready to take revenge after yesterdays interval start and Frida Karlsson had to go all in right from the start. Karlsson stated yesterday that the cold was a good practice when heading to the Olympic games in Beijing in February 2022 and stood her place also during today’s competition. But in the long uphill, heading the half of the race, the 22 year-old had to give way to Therese Johaug.
“I really tried to keep the speed up but Therese was just stronger today”, said Karlsson who manage to cross the finish line with an end result of 7.8 seconds behind the winner.
The fight for the third place on the podium was a tough one from the start to finish. Katharina Hennig (GER) headed into the race along with Johaug and managed to keep up the first stretch. However, as the pace was kept high, Hennig soon fell back to the following group including Ebba Andersson (SWE), Krista Pärmäkoski (FIN), Rosie Brennan (USA) as well as Heidi Weng (NOR).
Weng, who headed into the race 56 seconds after Karlsson claimed the fastest time of the day and was eager to continue in the same fashion that brought her into the successor group. But as Therese Johaug set the second fastest time of the day, there was no way to catch up. The third place was taken by Weng just 0.4 seconds before a photo finish decided about a fourth place for Krista Pärmäkoski and fifth place for Rosie Brennan.
