India’s Stanzin Lundup finished 104th in the men’s 10km freestyle skiing at the Milan Cortina Winter Olympics on Friday, finishing near the bottom of a strong field.
The 27-year-old Indian Army athlete clocked 28 minutes 26.7 seconds at the Tesero Cross Country Stadium to finish 104th out of 111 runners who completed the race. A total of 113 athletes started. One did not finish while the other was disqualified.
Lundup finished 7 minutes 50.5 seconds behind gold medalist Johannes Hoesflot Klaeb of Norway, who clocked 20:36.2 to win his eighth gold medal of the Winter Olympics. France’s Mathis Desloges took silver in 20:41.1, while Norway’s Einar Hedegart secured bronze in 20:50.2.
Klaebo has three more races on the program and thus equaled the all-time record of eight gold medals at the Winter Olympics. He joins Norwegian greats Marit Bjoergen, Bjoern Daehlie and Ole Einar Bjoerndalen who have all retired.
The 10km Freestyle Interval Start is a time trial format in which skiers start individually at fixed intervals and race against time on a 10km course that includes uphill, downhill and flat sections. The athlete with the fastest total time from start to finish is declared the winner.
Lundup’s selection for the games has been the subject of legal scrutiny. A bench of the Delhi High Court in a recent order held that another cross-country skier, Manjeet, was more deserving and ranked two places above Lundup, terming his disqualification as manifestly arbitrary and unfair.
The IOA submitted to the court that Manjeet’s name was not part of the long list and that all the dates for participation had expired. The Ministry of Sports later cleared Lundup’s participation, saying there would be no cost to the government.
Lundup is the fifth cross-country skier to represent India at the Winter Olympics. Bahadur Gurung Gupta was the first, finishing 78th in the men’s sprint in 2006. Tashi Lundup placed 83rd in the 15km event in 2010, while Nadeem Iqbal and Jagdish Singh finished 85th and 99th in 2014 and 2018, respectively.
India’s campaign at the Milan Cortina Winter Olympics will conclude on Monday with Mohammad Arif Khan competing in the men’s slalom in Alpine skiing. This will be Arif Khan’s second appearance at the Winter Olympics after featuring in the slalom and giant slalom at Beijing 2022.
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Issued by:
Saurabh Kumar
Published on:
February 13, 2026