When Therese Johaug starts the 15 km free technique today, she will be all by herself. She will need to fight hard if she wants to overtake Bjoergen and Kowalczyk, and one thing will go through her mind: her first individual World Championships gold medal from Oslo.
On the 5th March 2011, Bjoergen and Johaug were leading the 30 km in Oslo. Justyna Kowalczyk managed to overtake them, but Johaug sat in an extra gear, flying up the hill, and none of the other athletes saw her until the finish line. Johaug skied by herself for the last 15 km, fighting up and downhill. Bjoergen and Kowalczyk didn’t have a chance. Johaug won the race with a margin of 34 seconds down to Bjoergen and impressingly 1:34 down to Kowalczyk.
Johaug starts +2:26.9 minutes behind Kowalczyk, and will need to push herself in order to win seconds. The first athlete behind her will start more than a minute behind, meaning she will not have anyone helping her. “I skied fast by myself at the 30 km in Oslo, everything is possible” Johaug said to the Norwegian TV station NRK yesterday.
With challenging weather predictions with heavy snowfall, Johaug will have an advantage. Her strongest skills are endurance and the fact that she’s very light. The heavier the better she says.
Johaug’s coach, Egil Kristiansen thinks she can ski fast without any help. “Therese is really good skiing by herself. She doesn’t need much help from other athletes in order to do well, her capacity is enormous and she’s capable of doing the job herself, which she’s also motivated to do” Kristiansen says.
With three remaining stages of Tour de Ski, Johaug is happy to be finished with the sprint stages as well as the prologues. Johaug prefers the harder distances, preferably with tough uphill’s. Today is the first stage with her kind of conditions, two more will come in Val di Fiemme.
Source: nrk.no
