Digg It
We take you back four years ago...
A couple days ago, I wrote about Jessie Diggins and the U.S. women's winning the first Olympic medal by Americans ever in cross-country skiing four years ago, actually taking the Gold when Diggins came from behind to win by a whopping .19 seconds. The race was the 7.5k relay (4.6 miles) with her teammate Kikkan Randal.
(And then yesterday, Diggins won her second Olympic medal, a Bronze -- and the second-ever for the U.S. -- in the 1500m individual sprint.)
I mentioned at the time that announcer Steve Schlanger gave an enthusiastic call, but it was his maniacal analyst Chad Salmela who I thought would have his head explode. Salmela regularly goes bonkers screaming at anything exciting about the sport he dearly loves for any country, but this moment pushed him off beyond the edges of normalcy. And I mentioned that his cry of "HERE COMES DIGGINS!!!!! HERE COMES DIGGINS!!!!!" went off the Richter Scale for insane.
The thing is, all the times I've written about the truly-tremendous ending of this race, I've never actually shown it here. Because I couldn't find video of it with the maniacal Salmela call. Well...I actually found the final 40 seconds of the race -- and with the NBC call by Chad Salmela!! It was recorded off the TV screen, so the sound is a little muddled, but it's all clear enough and utterly joyful. And so, you'll finally get to see what I've been talking about.
At the very, very start of the video, Jessie Diggins quickly slides from third into second place, and that's where you'll see her for most of this -- and see how solidly behind she is. That is, until it counts. And that's when you'll hear how I wasn't exaggerating about Chad Salmela going all-crazed with his cry of "HERE COMES DIGGINS!!!!! HERE COMES DIGGINS!!!!!"
And just to be clear, this isn't just the first Gold Medal for the United States in any cross country event -- it's the first Olympic medal of any kind in cross country skiing for the country...ever.
So, HERE COMES DIGGINS!!!!!...
And just to add perspective, here's a really nice interview from four years ago, a few days after the race on CBS This Morning with the two Gold medal-winning teammates, Kikkan Randal (on the left) and Jessie Diggins.
Finally, as an unexpected bonus, I have a fun video to offer from NBC's coverage on the USA Network. After Monday's women's 15k biathlon (which combines cross-country skiing and riflery) and the surprisingly-high finish by American Deedra Irwin, They had their cross-country expert on to discuss it all. And that expert was the aforementioned Chad Salmela. To host Lindsay Czarniak's great credit, after referencing how emotional Deedra Irwin was after her race, she said -- "speaking of emotion" -- that she couldn't let Salmela leave without bringing up his "HERE COMES DIGGINS!!!" call from four years earlier. And it was great fun to see his own reaction, hear him talk about it, and also find out about his small connection to Diggins' early career.
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