Cross Country Skiing at the 2010 Vancouver Winter Games:

Norway had won the 2009 World Championship, but that team was Ola Vigen Hattestad and Johan Kjølstad, while in Vancouver they were represented by Petter Northug and Øystein Pettersen, as Pettersen stood in for Hattestad, who withdew on the morning of the race with a sore throat. The drama in this event started in the second semi-final heat when Teodor Peterson (SWE) slipped and broke his ski pole in the closing stages, thus eliminating Sweden, one of the favorites, when they could only finish eighth. The drama didn’t finish there as Leonid Korneyenko (BLR), leading in the approach to the finish line, took the wrong course, which resulted in the elimination of the Belarus team. The final itself was also exciting, coming down to Germany, Russia, and Norway contesting the race for the medals. Axel Teichmann (GER) made a break for home on the last lap, only to be caught by Aleksey Petukhov (RUS) and Norway’s Northug. Just before the final straight Northug overtook and pulled away from the other two skiers to win relatively comfortably. In a close contest for the silver and bronze medals, Teichmann just held on from Petukhov to claim the silver medal by 0.2 seconds. Northug was the men’s cross-country star in Vancouver, winning two golds and four medals.