VAL DI FIEMME, Italy - The woman who helped re-energize Olympic-level cross country skiing in the U.S. has done it again. Jessie Diggins, age 34, powered through the pain of injured ribs to capture a bronze medal on a bluebird day at the Tesero Cross-Country Skiing Stadium.
Diggins crossed the finish line in third place the 10 kilometer interval start freestyle late, with a late, agonizing surge at the end. The pain and passion were visible on her face before she collapsed to the snow.
"I knew it was going to be a really painful day. I was excited to have the opportunity to race," she said in a press conference after the medal ceremony.
One of her teammates, Hailey Swirbul, was the first to reach Diggins. "She's so tough, she digs deep," Swirbul said. "I worked as an EMT last winter and I saw some people in pain for broken bones and Jessie looked comparable, but she's okay."
Diggins injured her ribs when she crashed hard in her first race, a combined classic and freestyle "skiathlon." Speaking to reporters, she said an MRI showed that no ribs were broken. "There was blunt forced trauma. It's been hard to sleep," she said.
Swedish star skier Frida Karlsson took gold in dominant fashion, crossing the finish line 46 seconds ahead of of silver place finisher Ebba Andersson, also of Sweden. Diggins edged out fourth place finisher Astrid Oyre Slind of Norway by 3.3 seconds.
This was the third straight Olympics where Diggins medaled. At the 2018 Winter Games in South Korea, she and fellow U.S. skier Kikkan Randall snapped a decades-long medal drought by winning a gold medal in the team sprint freestyle. That was America's first-ever Olympic gold in the sport, and only the second ever, following Bill Koch's silver in Innsbruck in 1976. Four years later, Diggins won silver and bronze at the Beijing Olympics.
Speaking with NPR before the Olympics, Diggins talked about her ability to power through pain and fatigue.
"I've almost never failed to mentally find the will to dig for it," Diggins said. "Basically I ask myself one very simple question. 'How do I want to feel at the finish line?' I don't like living with regrets. I don't want to ever look back and think 'What if?"
Diggins is currently scheduled to compete in three more events during the Milan Cortina Games and said on Thursday she will continue to race despite her injury. She's announced that these will be her final Olympics and she will retire from competitive skiing this spring.
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