At the 2018 Olympics in South Korea, Jessie Diggins and Kikkan Randall won the free technique team sprint event. 

While Randall has since retired from World Cup level skiing, Diggins has kept racing and improving.

Diggins has posted 27 World Cup podiums, including 11 victories, since the last Olympics. She won the 2021 Tour de Ski, and was the first American to do so. She won the overall World Cup last year and was second in 2020. 

And it’s hard to get around that one Olympic gold medal brings the expectations of another. But the 30-year-old from Vermont tries to not let the pressure get to her.  

“One thing to understand is that when it comes to pressure, there will never be a point where you are enough, if you start listening to it, right, because then it’ll be ‘Will you podium?’ to ‘Why didn’t you win?’ And at some point, it’ll be, ‘Why didn’t you win by more? Why wasn’t it more impressive?’ There’s no end point,” says Diggins at the US Ski Team’s press conference prior to the Beijing departure. 

“There is a lot of external pressure. But that doesn’t mean I have to feel it, right?” 

What do you expect from the 2022 Olympics? 
“For me, success at the Games means crossing the finish line with nothing left in the tank. Being a good teammate. Doing everything possible to prepare. If I can do all those things and go, ‘I gave it everything I had,’ that will be success to me. It would be great if that’s a medal. It will be fine if it isn’t,” Diggins says during the press conference.

No doubt, the pandemic has made planning and preparing for the 2022 Olympics a touch-and-go task, and a lot of athletes and teams come to the Winter Games in Beijing with less racing experience than they had expected. 

This is no different for Diggins and the other 13 members of the US cross-country skiers to the 2022 Olympics. But the upbeat veteran of the US Olympic cross-country team always tries to look for the silver lining. 

Beijing 2022 – All you need to know

Constant change of plans
Following the 2022 Tour de Ski that finished on January 4, Diggins and the US World Cup team had planned to race the two World Cups in January. 

But due to a surge in Covid infections across Europe, both the World Cup in Les Rousses in France on January 14-16 and the World Cup in Planica in Slovenia on January 21-23 were cancelled. 

Accordingly, Diggins and her team headed to Livigno, Italy, to start their Olympic peaking plan somewhat earlier than planned. 

Diggins typically likes to race frequently as a part of her peaking plan. 

But with the cancellations of the World Cups, few other high-level racing options available and the looming fear of contracting Covid in the critical 30-day window prior to the Beijing Olympics, team time trials have been Diggins best option. 

However, Diggins explains that she thinks the lack of racing might actually improve her odds at the upcoming Olympics. 

“[The cancellation was] kind of a huge blessing in disguise,” she says. 

“I was able to fully absorb the Tour and then build in a full training block and move up to altitude sooner. I felt like, ‘Whoa, actually, this is kind of perfect.’ This is how I would have designed it, because I got in all the racing I needed to in terms of World Cups,” says Diggins and explains: 

“Mentally, I felt like the tour was kind of the icing on the cake in terms of getting mentally strong. In terms of being able to push myself – being mentally there, being positive in any situation, all of that – that was the best preparation I could have ever asked for.”

Six medal opportunities 
The women race four individual events and two team events at the 2022 Olympics. Diggins hope to race all of them.  

The first is the 15-kilometer skiathlon, on Saturday, February 5. The next is the skate sprint on Tuesday, February 8. Then there is the 10-kilometer classic race on February 10, and finally the 30-kilometer skate race on Sunday, February 20. Additionally, there is the relay on February 12 and the classic team sprint on February 16. 

FACTS: 2022 OLYMPICS 

Where: Beijing, China
When: February 4 to 20, 2022
What: Olympic Winter Games
Beijing 2022 – All you need to know 
What happens when: 
Complete schedule for the 2022 Winter Olympic Games, all sports. 
Who: 53 cross-country teams compete at the 2022 Olympics, fielding from 1 to 16 athletes each. 
All the cross-country ski teams to the Beijing Winter Olympics