Norway’s Johannes Hoesflot Klaebo completed an unprecedented sweep of all six cross-country skiing gold medals at the World Championships, capping it in Saturday’s grueling 50km race in front of tens of thousands in his hometown.
Klaebo, the world’s top male skier for much of the last decade, won the 50km freestyle (at 31 miles, longer than a marathon) in 1 hour, 57 minutes, 47.1 seconds.
He pulled away from Swede William Poromaa in the closing sprint by 2.1 seconds at Granasen Ski Center in Trondheim, about 10 minutes from where he lives. Commentator Chad Salmela said around 50,000 fans were expected to line the course.
Klaebo, 28, became the first cross-country skier to win all six events at worlds since the program was expanded from five events to six starting in 2001 for men and 2003 for women.
Russian Yelena Välbe won all five events at the 1997 Worlds, also in Trondheim.
Klaebo began worlds by winning the sprint (a race less than three minutes) for a fourth consecutive worlds, then the 20km skiathlon (combining classic and freestyle skiing) and the 10km interval start. He then anchored Norway’s team sprint and relay to gold.
Klaebo’s race Saturday was his toughest. His best event is the shortest. He had never won the 50km — the longest race — at a major championship, though he did cross the finish line first in 2021 before being disqualified for obstruction.
Klaebo became the third skier to win both the sprint and the longest race at worlds since the sprint debuted in 2001. The others were Norway’s Marit Bjoergen (2013) and Petter Northug (2015). Klaebo’s 15 career World Championships gold medals across all events are second only to Bjoergen’s 18.
Next up for Klaebo is the finish of the World Cup season. He leads the World Cup overall standings and can win a fifth career overall season title, one shy of countryman Bjorn Daehlie’s record.
More history beckons next February.
Klaebo already owns five Olympic titles from 2018 and 2022. He is three shy of the career Winter Olympic gold medals record across all sports.
“I’m not thinking much about 2026 right now,” Klaebo said last week. “The main goal now is what we are doing here now, and what we’re trying to accomplish here.”
NBC Sports’ Dan Meyer contributed to this report from Trondheim.
Jessie Diggins, Julia Kern take silver in cross-country skiing world championships team sprint
Jessie Diggins and Julia Kern won a team sprint medal for a second consecutive world championships.
