Cross Country Skiing at the 1964 Innsbruck Winter Games:

Alevtina Kolchina was highly favored to win her first Olympic gold medal in her third Olympic appearance. She had won three gold medals in the 1962 World Championships in Zakopane, and had also been victorious at Holmenkollen in 1961, 1962 and 1963 in the 10 km race.

At the halfway point Klavdiya Boyarskikh, a 24-year-old schoolteacher from Sverdlovsk, had a scant lead, only two seconds ahead of another Soviet skier, Yevdokiya Mekshilo. Kolchina was in third place, 15 seconds behind the leader, and Maria Gusakova, second after Kolchina in the 10 km race in World Championships 1962, followed in fourth place. The event developed into a very close race between Boyarskikh and Mekshilo, with Boyarskikh able to cling to the lead and win by 2.3 seconds. Kolchina faded in the last part of the track and dropped down to seventh place, and Gusakova with the fastest finish of the day advanced to bronze medal position. The best non-Soviet skier was Britt Strandberg, the only skier from the victorious Swedish relay team of 1960 competing in 1964, in fourth place, only 8.4 seconds outside the bronze medal.

For the first time female skiers from outside Europe competed in the Olympics, but the four skiers from People’s Republic of Korea and Mongolia ended in the last four placings in the final rankings.