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Marit Bjørgen
Personal information
Full name	Marit Bjørgen
Date of birth	March 21, 1980 (1980-03-21) (age 29)
Place of birth	Trondheim, Norway
Height	168 cm
Professional information
Club	Rognes IL
Skis	Fischer
World Cup
Seasons	1999–
Wins	36
Additional podiums	23
Total podiums	59
Infobox last updated on: March 14, 2010

Medal record
Women's cross country skiing
Competitor for Norway
Olympic Games
Gold	2010 Vancouver	Individual sprint
Gold	2010 Vancouver	Individual pursuit
Gold	2010 Vancouver	4 x 5 km relay
Silver	2002 Salt Lake City	4 × 5 km
Silver	2006 Turin	10 km classical
Silver	2010 Vancouver	30 km classical
Bronze	2010 Vancouver	10 km freestyle
World Championships
Gold	2003 Val di Fiemme	Individual sprint
Gold	2005 Oberstdorf	Team sprint
Gold	2005 Oberstdorf	30 km classical
Gold	2005 Oberstdorf	4 x 5 km
Silver	2003 Val di Fiemme	4 x 5 km
Silver	2005 Oberstdorf	7.5 km + 7.5 km double pursuit
Bronze	2005 Oberstdorf	10 km freestyle
Bronze	2007 Sapporo	Team sprint
Bronze	2007 Sapporo	4 x 5 km

Marit Bjørgen (born March 21, 1980 in Trondheim) is a cross country skier from Midtre Gauldal, Norway. She is a member of the Rognes IL ski club and is 5'6" (168 cm) tall, weighs 141 lb (64 kg), and is coached by Svein Tore Samdal. She won the most medals at the 2010 Winter Olympics: five, including three gold medals.

World Cup

Bjørgen initially excelled at the sprint events, and seven victories in that event was enough to give her second place overall in the 2003/04 World Cup season. However in the 2004/05 season, Bjørgen became an accomplished distance skier.

On March 19, 2006 in Sapporo, Japan Bjørgen claimed her second FIS World Cup title. Bjørgen led the overall World Cup by 66 points, ahead of Canada's Beckie Scott going into the final race of the season, the 2 x 7.5 km double pursuit. Scott needed to win the race and for Bjørgen to finish no higher than eighth to claim the title. Scott did win the race but Bjørgen came fourth, winning the crystal globe with 1036 points to Scott's 1020. Bjørgen also won the sprint title for the season, 6 points ahead of Norway's Ella Gjømle, making the 2005/06 season the fourth season in a row that Bjørgen has won the sprint title. Bjørgen finished the distance standings in fourth place, 108 points behind Russia's Julija Tchepalova.

Marit Bjørgen in Otepää during the 2005–06 FIS Cross-Country World Cup.

Bjørgen made the podium eight times during the 2005/06 season, six of them in first place, one second and one third place. Bjørgen now has 55 podium finishes, 32 of them in first place, 13 in second and 10 in third. Most of her victories have been in the sprint, which is by far her most successful event. Seven of these victories were in the 2003/04 season and they have decreased in the past few seasons whilst her results in the other disciplines have improved. She has four victories in the 10 km and three in the pursuit. Her two other victories came in the 30 km in 2004/05 and the other in the 45 km Vasaloppet in 2005/06.

Bjørgen has competed in the World Cup since 2000, when she finished the season in 53rd place overall and 48th in the sprints. The season after she finished the overall season in 32nd and the sprint in 36th. The season after however (2002/03) she won the sprint title and finished in 6th place overall. The 2003/04 season was Bjørgen best season up until that time when she again won the sprint title, and came 11th in the distance standings, finishing the season in 2nd place behind Gabriella Paruzzi. In the 2004/05 season she won all the titles, and again won the overall and sprint title in 2005/06.

World Championships

Bjørgen has four World Championship gold medals, two of them solo. Her first goldmedal in the World Championships came in the individual sprint in Val di Fiemme in 2003, where she also picked up a silver in the 4 x 5 km. Her three other gold medals came in Oberstdorf in 2005 in the 30 km classical, team sprint, and 4 x 5 km. She also won a silver in the 7.5 km + 7.5 km double pursuit and a bronze in the 10 km free in the same games. At the 2007 championships in Sapporo, Bjørgen won two bronze medals in team sprint (with Astrid Jacobsen) and in the 4 x 5 km.

Olympics

Bjørgen had a disappointing Winter Olympics in Turin. She suffered from bronchitis a week before the games started and was prescribed antibiotics, then in the first race of the games, the 7.5 km + 7.5 km double pursuit, Bjørgen withdrew during the classic phase complaining of an upset stomach. In the next event, the team sprint, Bjørgen and Hilde G. Pedersen came fourth, and despite winning a silver in the 10 km, the remainder of the games went poorly for her. The next event was the 4 x 5 km relay, where Bjørgen took the anchor leg and finished in fifth place, the first time since 1988 that Norway had failed to reach the podium in the women’s relay. In the individual sprint, Bjørgen failed to make the semi finals, and both Bjørgen and Pedersen decided not to compete in the 30 km and returned home to Norway. Afterwards she was quoted as saying she was "sick and tired of Pragelato and OL (Olympic games)".^[1]

However Bjørgen recovered to win the 45 km Vasaloppet from Oxberg to Mora on the March 4, eight days after the end of the Winter Olympics. Bjørgen broke away with Hilde Pedersen and Vibeke Skofterud after only 10 km, but Skofterud couldn't keep up with the pace and fell back, and Bjørgen powered away from Pedersen with a few kilometres left, winning in a time of 2:17:53, 1:22 ahead of Pedersen and 3:23 ahead of Petra Majdic of Slovenia. Winning a purse of 88,000 SEK and also winning two of the three sprints during the race to add another 10,000 SEK. Then three days later on the March 7, Bjørgen finished second in the individual sprint event in Borlaenge, Sweden.

In the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver, Bjørgen finished third in the 10 km freestyle event, before winning her first Olympic gold medal in the sprint. In the sprint she was up against a very strong field which consisted of Petra Majdič of Slovenia, who had taken a serious fall earlier in the day during qualification and Justyna Kowalczyk of Poland who was leading the overall World Cup standings coming into the race. Bjørgen won her second gold in the 7.5 x 2 in the 2010 Olympics on the 19th of February 2010. Bjørgen was also part of the 4 x 5 km relay team that won gold in the 2010 Olympics on the 25th of February 2010, finishing with enough time to cross the line with a large Norwegian flag given to her by a spectator near the finish, and jumping over the finish line. She closed out her trip in Vancouver by losing out to gold to Poland's Justyna Kowalcyzk by 0.3 seconds in the women's 30 km event.

Asthma medications

In the 2009/2010 season World Anti Doping Agency allowed Marit to use a stronger asthma medication (salbutamol) which is forbidden on the WADA doping List[1]. According to the Norwegian coach Egil Kristiansen her use of salbutamol was the main reason why she had improved so much for the season 2009/2010.^[2][3] Bjørgen continued to use the medication over the olympics 2010 and was strongly criticized by Justyna Kowalczyk who accused her for doping.^[4][5] Bjørgen claims that she wouldn't have any advantage of the medicine unless she had asthma but studies show that also a person without asthma has advantage of supra-therapeutic doses of the medicine.^[6][7][8] In the new prohibited-list for 2010: "Salbutamol – a substance considered as specified and therefore more likely to result in a sanction of a warning to a two-year ban in case of anti-doping rule violations – will be permitted under 1,000 nanograms per millilitre.".^[9]

Holmenkollen

Bjørgen won the women's 30 km event at the Holmenkollen ski festival in 2005. She won the same event five years later in 2010. This was the first World Cup event to be held at Holmenkollen since the completion of the new ski jumping hill. For her win in both the 30 km and the sprint event, along with her successes at the 2010 Games in Vancouver, Bjørgen was awarded the Holmenkollen medal.

References

• ESPN
• Aftenposten
• fasterskier

External links

• Fansite (Russian)
• Marit Bjoergen at the International Ski Federation
• "Holmenkollmedaljen til Bjørgen". - 13 March 2010 skiforbundet.no article accessed 14 March 2010.
• Holmenkollen winners since 1892 - click Vinnere for downloadable pdf file (Norwegian)