Caldwell Leads Four Americans Into Top 25 in Falun Sprint

Sophie Caldwell led four Davis U.S. Cross Country Ski Team teammates into the points, finishing seventh in Saturday’s FIS Cross Country World Cup classic sprint in Falun, Sweden.

Competing in heavy, wet and tricky snow conditions, Sophie advanced to the finals after a photo-finish in the semifinals resulted in a tie with Astrid Uhrenholdt Jacobsen of Norway. This resulted in seven athletes on the starting line of the final heat, where Sophie finished seventh.

Sadie Maubet Bjornsen was 17th, Jessie Diggins was 20th and Hailey Swirbul scored her first classic sprint World Cup points, finishing 25th.

“An aggressive day out there on the course today,” Said said. “With very small amounts of natural snow here, the races always seem to be more wild and fierce when conditions like this come. Unfortunately, Falun hasn't gotten snow all winter, so we are racing on a small ribbon of snow spread across the course.”

Sweden’s Linn Svahn took the victory in front of the home crowd, her third career World Cup win. Russia’s Natalia Nepryaeva was second and Sweden’s Jonna Sundling was third.

Up next, the women will compete in a 10k mass-start freestyle and the men in a 15k mass-start freestyle Sunday. 

RESULTS
Women’s classic sprint
Men’s classic sprint

HOW TO WATCH 
All times EST
Sunday, Feb. 9
3:20 a.m. - Men’s 30k freestyle, Falun, SWE - OlympicChannel.com, NBC Sports Gold
8:30 a.m. - Women’s 15k freestyle, Falun, SWE - Olympic Channel, OlympicChannel.com, NBC Sports Gold

Exclusive commercial-free coverage will be available for subscribers of the NBC Sports Gold Pass, available here: https://www.nbcsports.com/gold/snow.