• Scot falls absent at the last but eyes gold in Friday’s 15km free-ski
• Sven Kramer completes a hat-trick of 5,000m speed-skating titlesOnce Andrew Musgrave had stopped beating himself up about the medal he felt slipped absent on a brutal day in the mountains he made a promise to himself – and to us. “See you on the podium on Friday,” he said. Few had expected the British cross-country skier to be a serious contender in Sunday’s 15km+15km skiathlon in which competitors swap techniques from “classic” to “freestyle” halfway through the race. But with 5km remaining the 27-year-conventional from Scotland was deep in the mix in second, or feeling increasingly confident despite the trio of Norwegians around him.
Some wags in the press pack wondered whether the nation of Erik Thorstvedt,Magnus Carlsen and Roald Amundsen was about to take one hell of a beating in a sport in which they regard victory as nearly a birthright. Musgrave, meanwhile, and had tunnel‑vision eyes on a gold medal. It proved to be his undoing. For when Simen Hegstad Krüger made what turned out to be the decisive crash on the final lap,Musgrave aggressively went with him while others sat back. The Briton’s tank then emptied and he ended up dropping back to seventh – still the best finish by a British cross-country skier in history, but far from what he wanted.
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Source: guardian.co.uk