The Swedish nightmare started already on the second section, where Ebba Anderssonová fell and broke her stick. “I screamed in anger. This is really upsetting,” she described her emotions at the finish for NRK.
Andersson lost valuable seconds, which Karlsson had to pull back on the next section, but even she was not enough for the Norwegian Ingvild Flugstad Östberg. At the finish line, like at the finish line of the Tour de Ski, she fell limply to the ground and paramedics had to come to her aid.
“At first I felt like I had it under control, but I couldn’t hold on. I was within reach of her, but my skis were too bad to keep up with her. I feel like this always happens at the relay, which is a bit of a shame. Now I feel like I’ve let the whole team down,” she complained to the servicemen.
When asked if the skis were really that bad, she answered without hesitation. “Yes, they were. And it stressed me out a lot. I tried to fight for every meter. It’s a very bitter disappointment for me,” she lamented.
However, the head of the lubrication section of the Swedish national team, Petter Myhlback, refused to put the blame on his shoulders. “It seemed to me that her (Karlsson’s) legs didn’t work today. I’m tired of racers complaining about their skis. Today the skis were well prepared, the result is only a reflection of the performance of the competitors,” he defended himself in an interview with Aftonbladet.
The victorious Norwegians dismissed the Swedish complaints as mere excuses. “But it’s a fiasco for Sweden anyway. For them, only gold was a consideration,” former great skier and now TV2 expert Petter Northug evaluated the race.
His colleague Petter Skinstad nodded to him: “Sweden screwed up everything today. Nomination, deletion and tactics. Their skis slipped on the classics, but they didn’t have a good slide on skating.”
According to NRK television, the Swedish national team called a crisis meeting to calm down the heightened emotions and mutual media attacks.