American men can’t win Olympic cross-country skiing medals – or can they?

Ever since Jessie Diggins began collecting Olympic medals and crystal globes and staking her claim because the world's best cross-country skier, she has made it clear that she wants her legacy to be greater than just wins and podiums.

She desires to create a brand new generation of top American skiers, including amongst men who haven’t yet achieved the success that American women have.

Diggins may very well be on the cusp of doing so — with major support from Ben Ogden and Gus Schumacher, two 24-year-olds who could also be on the verge of taking American cross-country skiing to unprecedented levels.

These are the blokes who watched Diggins' every move as a toddler, watched her collect trophies and medals, and believed that someday they may do it too. These are the blokes who find yourself on podiums at the top of the races and provides fist bumps to Norwegians and Swedes.

You hear half-drunk Scandinavians chanting their names as they whiz past on snowy tracks through the forests of Europe, especially Ogden. His mustache and flat-out style have captured the imagination of Nordic skiing fans in the game's spiritual centers in Northern and Central Europe. In American skiing circles he’s in comparison with Steve Prefontaine, the mustachioed track star of the Nineteen Seventies who skied like Ogden, with a fearlessness that would hurt your lungs just to observe.

It wasn't way back, perhaps the summer before last, that Ogden, a 6-foot-10 man from Vermont, would act embarrassed when people asked him what he did for a living. Sometimes he told half-truths and focused on his studies as a part-time mechanical engineering student on the University of Vermont, as if racing on the World Cup circuit were a part-time job.

No longer.

“I just think, 'I'm a skier, I'm a pro skier,'” Ogden said during an interview this fall in New York, a couple of weeks before he and Schumacher traveled to Europe for nearly five months. “I’m much prouder.”

After winning the coveted green jersey because the fastest skier under 23 within the 2022-23 season, Ogden achieved his in the primary stage of last season's Tour de Ski, a multi-race event that began with a sprint in Dobbiaco first podium finish in his profession. Italy, but COVID-19 and mononucleosis shortened its season. This season, he posted the very best qualifying time within the sprint in Lillehammer, Norway, in early December, finished fifteenth overall within the Tour de Ski earlier this month and secured his second World Cup podium with a 3rd place finish within the Tour de Ski on Friday his profession 10-kilometer skate race in Les Rousses, France.

As for Schumacher, last February the rugged Alaskan thrilled some 40,000 fans who lined the route of the 10-kilometer World Cup race in Minnesota, where he became the youngest American ever to win a World Cup and the primary American man to achieve this Distance event has been winning since 1983. He already has three top 10 placements this season and is in twelfth place in the gap rating.

“We used to celebrate the top 30 (placements), and the top 20 was crazy because if you get into the top 20, you get paid,” said Schumacher, sitting next to Ogden in a club chair at a midtown Manhattan hotel. “Now it’s the top 10, because if you finish in the top 10 you could definitely have been on the podium. Depending on how things go, you can win.”

Ben Ogden and Gus Schumacher


Ben Ogden (left) and Gus Schumacher give the Americans a likelihood to finish the 50-year drought for the reason that U.S. won its only Olympic medal in men's cross-country skiing. (Michael Loccisano/Getty Images)

In total, six American Nordic skiers finished on the rostrum within the 2023-24 season, including Ogden, Schumacher and Diggins, who won the Crystal Globe for the general title for the second time prior to now 4 seasons.

As recently as 2018, the United States was searching for its first Olympic medal in cross-country skiing since Bill Koch won the silver medal within the 30-kilometer race in 1976. That was the one American cross-country skiing medal until Diggins began collecting it first with Kikkan Randall in a team sprint in 2018 after which in two individual races 4 years later.

At 33 years old, Diggins has won so many major awards in her sport. She could retire tomorrow and call it an epic profession. During a conference call with reporters before the season, she said being a part of the U.S. team, which spends much of the winter traveling and living together because it could't drive home between races, all the time played a crucial role in her decision to come back back again.

“I love what I do and I love who I do it with,” Diggins said. “It’s hard being on the road for four months. The idea of ​​doing this together with this team and going for relay podiums and (the) Nations Cup, things like that when we come together is so exciting to me.”

In recent years, and even in other sports, some men have been in a position to resist the concept of ​​using a female champion as a task model. On the US Nordic team, Diggins serves as team captain, big sister, mother and chief glitter application officer. During Schumacher's first few years within the World Cup, Diggins put him up in the home she rented in the course of the Christmas holidays.

He and Ogden are feeling a bit more mature after last season, once they first felt strong enough to make some decisions for themselves and work out what might work best for them as individuals. They contracted COVID-19 at the identical time in January. After their period of isolation was over, but before they may start competing and training again, they decided to travel to Spain to enjoy a couple of days of heat and sun on the beaches near Valencia relatively than within the cool Switzerland to cover.

They've even talked about doing it again this season, as a type of mid-season break that their European rivals get every few weeks once they head home.

“Just to get away from the racing scene a little bit,” Schumacher said.

Gus Schumacher


“We used to celebrate top 30 placements,” says Gus Schumacher about his progress on this sport. “Now it’s the top 10, because if you finish in the top 10, you could have been on the podium.” (Maja Hitij / Getty Images)

As skiers, Ogden and Schumacher approach the game from different perspectives. Ogden excels in shorter races. He's never really experienced a race where he didn't wish to be on fire from the beginning. Schumacher is healthier at longer distances. His specialty is setting the pace and pondering through races.

“I think I’ve made good progress as a patient racer,” he said. “During a distance race, I like to look around, enjoy my surroundings and think – but that doesn't mean you don't do that,” he said as he turned to Ogden.

Ogden immediately interrupted him.

“No, I don’t,” he said.

While they’ve improved, their peer groups have shifted somewhat. The nature of cross-country skiing is that you just spend a lot time competing with competitors on sometimes wooded, distant routes that you just find yourself being friendliest with the people you arrive on the finish with.

Aside from the US team, they were initially friendliest with the less skiing nations. Then they became friends with the Swedes. Now they get to know the vaunted Norwegians, the kings of sport.

Ogden's father, who introduced him to cross-country skiing, died within the 2023 offseason. When the season began again, Norwegian Johannes Klaebo, just about the very best skier on this planet, was considered one of the primary to come back as much as him and offer his condolences pronounced.

“That was pretty incredible,” Ogden said.

The relationship between the Norwegians and the US cross country team is funny. The Norwegians are always telling Americans how they wish to excel because they see an enormous potential market within the US. They know that American success can be good for the game. They witnessed this firsthand because the throngs of cross-country enthusiasts greeted them in Minnesota, drawing a number of the largest crowds the game had ever seen.

“Then we win and it’s like a national crisis for them and they fire their wax technicians,” Schumacher said, only half-joking.

Like everyone else this season, their eyes widen as they consider February's World Cup in Trondheim, Norway, the largest event before the 2026 Olympics in Italy. Can they win medals there within the relay or team sprint? Perhaps. More individual podiums would even be great.

Above all, they need to make their presence clear. They wish to be a part of the conversation and feel like they’ll win each time they race.

“We want to be someone that people look out for,” Ogden said. “We do this for other people. At the moment it suits us.”

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