Norway

The Norwegian Johannes Høsflot Klaebo continued his historic career in the Milan Cortina Games by setting the record for the most gold medals won by an athlete in a single Winter Olympic Games.

Klaebo’s victory in the 50-kilometer mass start race shattered the nearly 50-year-old record set by American speed skater Eric Heiden, who won five golds at the Lake Placid Olympics in 1980. However, all of Heiden’s victories were in individual races and two of Klaebo’s were in team events, so Heiden’s record for individual victories still stands.

Klaebo’s teammates Martin Loewstroem Nyenget took silver and Emil Iversen won bronze in a Norwegian sweep.

The three Norwegians took an early lead and then continued to increase the gap on their pursuers.

On the final lap, Nyenget and Klaebo pushed uphill and took down Iversen. Klaebo remained in second place, hoping to launch his textbook load up the hill.

When the two reached the last hill, Klaebo literally fled Nyenget and headed towards glory.

As he slid toward the finish line, he pointed his fingers toward the sky, took a step across the line, fell on his right hip, and rolled onto his back.

The 29-year-old entered the Games with five gold medals to his name. With his six medals in Milan Cortina, has been broken and extended the previous record of eight most Winter Olympic gold medals in his career.

He is now the second most decorated gold medalist in Olympic history after American Michael Phelps, who is 23.

The victory gave Norway a record 18th gold medal and further increased its lead in the total medal count at these games to 40 in total.

The Norwegian team broke their own gold medal record in a single Winter Olympics on Friday, when Johannes Dale-Skjevdal won the 15-kilometer mass start biathlon race.