The Russian skier inspired a lot of hope with his brilliant performance at the Tour de Ski. For almost four years our team had not competed for medals at a prestigious international level, and then Savely Korostelev almost took bronze on the final mountain in Italy. And in general, the athlete’s progress impressed even Swedish and Norwegian journalists. At the World Cup stage in Oberhof, the Russian was preparing to further build on his success, especially since there are only a few weeks left before the Olympics in Italy.

Without Klebo, but still surrounded by Norwegians

The stage in Germany consisted of a sprint discipline and a race with a time trial. Savely skipped the first part of the program, which caused a lot of controversy in Russia. Still, the sprint turned out to be the most vulnerable part for both Korostelev and Daria Nepryaeva after returning to the world stage. And missing the actual final test before the Olympics was quite strange. However, it is, of course, better for the coaches and the athlete himself to know why and why this was done.

The extra day of rest, in theory, should have helped Savely in the 10 km time trial race in the classical style – one of his favorite disciplines. The Russian received the 42nd starting number, and a total of 79 skiers were entered. Korostelev was literally surrounded by Norwegians, with Didrik Tenseth (39th), Howard Museby (40th) and Erik Valnes (44th) going into the race next to him. All of them are excellent landmarks, so it could have been a little easier for Savely to follow the progress of the race.

It is curious that the main star of the Norwegian team, Johannes Klebo, decided to skip the World Cup stage in Oberhof, and another team leader, Harald Amundsen, did not come to Germany. No official reasons were given, but one could assume that the athletes were simply working according to their plan shortly before the start of the 2026 Games.

Savely Korostelev / Photo: © Grega Valancic/VOIGT / Contributor / Getty Images Sport / Gettyimages.ru

The medal is very close

Korostelev started the race at a calm pace and showed the sixth intermediate time during acceleration, 3.5 seconds behind the Swede Kalla Halfvarsson. Soon the Norwegian Valnes took over first place, but our fans, of course, were primarily interested in Saveliy. The 2.6 km cut-off should have become much more indicative; after all, a quarter of the distance was behind us, and the first scenarios began to emerge. And here the Russian was eighth, losing about 10 seconds to Valnes and 7 seconds to Halfvarsson.

At subsequent cutoffs, Korostelev kept the same distance from the Swede and even won back a little from the Norwegian. Halfway through the distance, Savely was already in third place. Although there were still many strong skiers behind, it became clear that the Russian would fight for at least a place in the top ten. To do this, it was necessary to maintain speed, or even better, increase it over the next five kilometers.

Another Norwegian, Martin Njengeth, looked great, having just wedged himself into the intermediate top 3 along with Valnes and Halfvarsson. A kilometer before the finish, Savely came within just two seconds of the Swede! Is it really possible to fight for a medal? I really wanted to believe this, because Kalle did not complete the final meters of the distance in the best way. And the Russian managed to beat his opponent by only 0.5 seconds!

Then we just had to wait for the others to finish. It was, unfortunately, obvious that Valnes would get ahead of Savely. And so it happened, after all, it was unrealistic to win back 10 seconds in a short period. The Italian Elia Barp also climbed ahead, taking an intermediate second place. Korostelev thus fell back to third position, but again it was clear that Nyenget, who ultimately won the race, was flying further along the track.

As a result, the Russian skier took fifth place, which in any case was an excellent result. Moreover, the gap from the victorious Nyengeth was only 24 seconds. And this is much more important than the final position at the finish line. On the eve of the Olympics, Korostelev showed excellent preparation, which gives every reason to expect a fight for medals in Milan and Cortina d’Ampezzo. And this is already an objective reality.