{"id":400387,"date":"2018-02-10T13:24:09","date_gmt":"2018-02-10T13:24:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=400387"},"modified":"2018-02-10T13:24:09","modified_gmt":"2018-02-10T13:24:09","slug":"swedens-kalla-wins-first-gold-medal-pyeongchang-2018","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/2018\/02\/swedens-kalla-wins-first-gold-medal-pyeongchang-2018\/","title":{"rendered":"Sweden’s Kalla wins first gold medal of Pyeongchang 2018"},"content":{"rendered":"
Sweden’s Charlotte Kalla won the women’s skiathlon to secure the first gold medal of Pyeongchang 2018.<\/p>\n
The 30-year-old beat defending champion Marit Bjorgen by 7.8 seconds but the Norwegian still became the most decorated female Winter Olympian of all time.<\/p>\n
Bjorgen’s silver means that the 37-year-old now has a total of 11 medals.<\/p>\n
Kalla won in 40 minutes 44.9 seconds to claim her third Olympic gold, while Finland’s Krista Parmakoski was third.<\/p>\n
“I was quite nervous today and the Olympics is something I have focused on for a long, long time,” said Kalla.<\/p>\n
“On the finish line. I did not want to look back and just focused on keeping pushing.”<\/p>\n
Skiathlon is a mass start 15km cross country event in which competitors have to swap techniques midway through the race.<\/p>\n
There is a pit-stop halfway through the race where athletes change skis and poles to go from classic to free technique.<\/p>\n
Kalla, Bjorgen and Norwegian Heidi Weng were on the podium at Sochi 2014 and at the halfway point only 3.3 seconds separated them in the top four.<\/p>\n
But Kalla had broken clear by the 12.5km mark and, by 13.5km, she had opened up an unassailable lead of almost 10 seconds.<\/p>\n