The fight for the women’s overall 2022-23 Tour de Ski title tightened as Lotta Udnes Weng won before her twin sister Tiril and teammate Mathilde Myhrvold in Friday’s classic sprint in Val di Fiemme, Italy: an all-Norwegian family affair. Lotta and Tiril Udnes Weng grabbed the two top spots in the final in the first of three deciding days of the tour, Lotta finishing 0.35 second before her sister as compatriot Mathilde Myhrvold claimed the third place. It is the 26-year-old’s first individual World Cup victory this season. Overall Tour de Ski leader Frida Karlsson from Sweden had been eliminated in the quarterfinal, giving the opponents a chance to close the gap to her: having had a 1:28 lead coming into the final leg of the tour, Karlsson’s advantage ahead of No.2 Tiril Udnes Weng shrunk to 41 seconds, with Saturday’s 15km mass start and Sunday’s 10km mass start final climb remaining. Finland’s Krista Parmakoski is in the overall third place, 1:05 after Karlsson, while Lotta Udnes Weng’s win brought her up to a fourth place, 1:27 from the top.
