Charlotte Kalla, SWE (Tour leader)
In the summer and autumn I never thought that I would be wearing the golden bib during the Tour. Yesterday evening we had a singing competition (Sing star) at the hotel — Sweden against Norway. Sweden won, maybe because the songs were Swedish. My plan for the race today was to go out quite hard, but with control. I wanted to make my own race and not stress too much. I like to hunt, so it was perfect for me to go out behind the others. I had great skis today; the wax man had done a very good job. Tomorrow I want to make a good race and not stress, but have good technique.
Arianna Follis, ITA (Lady of the day)
Today again, I did a good race. I'm satisfied. We will see what happens tomorrow. I'm a little bit afraid of tomorrow since I'm not very good with the classical race. Yesterday I relaxed and went early to bed.
Lukas Bauer, CZE (Tour leader)
I too went to bed early yesterday. Tomorrow, I have to be good. I don't have enough seconds in front of the others. I have many concurrents in the race now. In Italy, Piller Cottrer will be in his home country and will have a lot of support from the audience. For me it was a big advantage to compete in my home country. I never raced the final climb, just saw it on TV. So now, I don't know what to expect, but to start with now I look at tomorrow.
Pietro Piller Cottrer, ITA (Man of the day)
One of the reasons to why the Italian team was successful today is that we didn't celebrate much yesterday, but went to bed early. I want to thank my waxing staff, they and my skis did half the job for me. My skis were very fast.
I like this kind of hunting race, today's race and last 15 km hunting shows that it is much more fun for spectators and athletes than normal pursuit. My plan today was to come at lesa second so that in tomorrow's classical race I could start at least 30 sec before Lukas. It will be good to start as third last tomorrow and I will try to reduce my gap and be ready to fight in my home country. My plan for Italy is of course to be first. My wish is to be at least in top ten.
SOURCE: FIS
For the full articles:
Kalla and Follis
Bauer and Piller Cottrer
