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Norway's Simen Hegstad Krueger gave the rest of the field in the
skiathlon a huge head start and in the end it didn't matter as he
still coasted to an easy and incredible gold medal during his
first-ever Olympic event.
In the first 200 meters of the 30 kilometer race, the 68-skier field started in rows. Krueger appeared to get tripped from behind and he went down hard.
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< class="source-only source">NBC
Two other skiers got tangled up with Krueger and landed on top of him.
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< class="source-only source">Kai
Pfaffenbach/Reuters
Krueger immediately fell to last place and had to exude extra energy just getting back up restarting.
On top of that, he broke a pole. He discarded it and had to have it replaced.
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< class="source-only source">NBC
Over the next 22 kilometers, Krueger methodically, and seemingly easily, passed 62 other racers to move into fifth place with 8 km to go.
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< class="source-only source">NBC
Then, with about 12 minutes to go in the race, Krueger took the lead.
He had passed 67 other skiers with time to spare.
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< class="source-only source">NBC
But he wasn't done.
In a performance that can best be described as some combination of awesome, courageous, and (Katie) Ledeckian, Krueger put distance between himself and the rest of the field.
At one point, his lead grew to 22 seconds and the other skiers could barely be seen in the screen.
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< class="source-only source">NBC
Even Krueger was surprised at how dominating he was.
"I knew that my chance was to go early, try to surprise the group," Krueger said. "When I got those meters, I had to go for it. I did not believe it when I turned and there was no one there. I just had to keep pushing forward until the final."
In the end, Krueger coasted across the finish line for the gold.
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