Cross-Country Skiing Legendary Athletes 1-15 of 15 items
Marjo Matikainen
At the Sarajevo 1984 Olympic Winter Games, Marjo Matikainen helped the Finnish team win a bronze medal in the 4 x 5-kilometre cross-country skiing relay when she was only 19 years old. >>>
Eero Mäntyranta
Eero Mäntyranta earned his first gold medal in 1960 at the Squaw Valley Olympic Winter Games as a member of Finland's 4 x 10-kilometre men’s relay team. >>>
Stefania Belmondo
Only 1.55 metres tall and weighing 47 kg, Stefania Belmondo was an unlikely heroine in the rugged sport of cross-country skiing. >>>
Manuela Di Centa
Manuela Di Centa had competed in 23 Olympic and world championship cross-country skiing races without winning a gold medal. >>>
Veikko Hakulinen
Finnish cross-country skier Veikko Hakulinen earned seven Olympic medals, including three gold, each won in a different event and in a different year. >>>
Ole Ellefsæter
At the Grenoble 1968 Olympic Winter Games, Ole Ellefsæter, a forestry technician and pop singer, earned a gold medal as the final skier on Norway's 4x10-kilometre men’s cross-country skiing relay team. >>>
Vyacheslav Vedenin
Soviet Vyacheslav Vedenin won the 30-kilometre mass start cross-country skiing race by 54.15 seconds at the Sapporo 1972 Olympic Winter Games. >>>
Harald Grönningen
By the 1968 Grenoble Olympic Winter Games, Harald Grönningen had already won three Olympic silver medals in cross-country skiing. >>>
Toini Gustafsson
At the Innsbruck 1964 Olympic Winter Games, Toini Gustafsson finished in eighth place in the 10-kilometre cross-country skiing race and sixth in the 5-kilometre event before she earned a silver medal in the 3x5-kilometre relay as part of the Swedish team. >>>
Vegard Ulvang
Vegard Ulvang came from Kirkenes, Norway, north of the Arctic Circle. An adventurer, in the year before his first Olympic Games, Ulvang climbed Mt. Denali in Alaska and spent 15 days skiing across Greenland in the footsteps of explorer Fridtjof Nansen. >>>
Raisa Smetanina
Raisa Smetanina holds a prominent place in the Olympic Winter Games record book. >>>
Tamara Tikhonova
For Tamara Tikhonova of the Soviet Union, the Calgary 1988 Olympic Winter Games began inauspiciously as she placed only fifth in the 10-kilometre cross-country ski race. >>>
Björn Dæhlie
Cross-country skier Björn Dæhlie holds several all-time Olympic Winter Games records >>>
Oddbjørn Hagen
Oddbjørn Hagen had a passion for first place. Winning two consecutive Nordic combined world championships in both 1934 and 1935, he set a record that would take 66 years to beat. >>>
Sixten Jernberg
Swedish cross-country skier Sixten Jernberg made his Olympic debut at the 1956 Cortina d’Ampezzo Games. >>>
