50 kilometres (Freestyle), Men

Bjørn Dæhlie was not at his best in the marathon distance, and had never won the event at the World Championships. But he was a strong freestyler and had won the gold medal in the event at the 1992 Winter Olympics, placing fourth in 1994. The last two World Champions had been Mika Myllylä of Finland in 1997, and Silvio Fauner of Italy in 1995. Myllylä had won the 1996-97 distance World Cup, had already won the 30 km in Hakuba, and might have been a slight favorite, but he was not entered for this race.

The race was extremely close. Dæhlie started slowly and was only 10th at the first checkpoint, moved to fourth at the halfway point, and pulled ahead at around 40 km. The early leader was Austrian Christian Hoffmann but he was worn down by Dæhlie’s steady approach, and would drop back to the bronze medal position. It was left to Sweden’s Niklas Jonsson to challenge the Norwegian superstar. Jonsson started slightly ahead of Dæhlie but at 40 km, he was 30 seconds behind. Then he closed very quickly, but was unable to fully close the lead, and Dæhlie won by 8.1 seconds, as they both collapsed across the line.

And thus ended the Olympic career of Bjørn Dæhlie, the greatest ever cross-country skier. He competed at the 1999 World Championships, with what was, for him, minimal success (a silver and a bronze), and then retired after a roller ski accident in early 2000. In his Olympic career, he won 12 medals and eight gold medals, both absolute Winter Olympic records. His six individual gold medals equals the Winter Olympic mark set by Soviet speed skater Lidiya Skoblikova in 1960-64. At the World Championships Dæhlie won 17 medals and nine gold medals.