| Bente Skari Announces Retirement< |
Norway's Olympic champion Bente Skari, currently the world's top woman Nordic skier, said on Friday she would end her career because she lacks motivation. The Olympic and world champion won 17 races this season, dominating the rest of the field.
One of Norway's most successful skiers in recent years, Skari won two gold medals at the world championships at Val di Fiemme in Italy last month but had to skip some races because of a stomach bug.
Skari, 30, won gold in the first event, the women's 15-kilometre mass start and also the 10-km classic event.
"I lack motivation to start a new season," Skari told reporters after clinching her 16th Norwegian championship gold medal at Meraaker in central Norway.
Skari, who has mastered both the classic and skating styles of cross-country skiing, clinched this year's World Cup with 17 wins, far ahead of her rivals. She has a career total of 44 World Cup victories.
"I have had a fantastic life as a skier, but it requires an incredible amount of planning and prioritising which I am not motivated for right now," Skari said.
Married to Geir Skari, she had previously hinted that she would like to become a mother and said that she would not ski competitively after having children. She told reporters she was not pregnant.
Well known for sporting a range of different hair colours, which have varied from purple to bright blue during her skiing career, Skari followed in her father Odd Martinsen's footsteps by winning Olympic gold. Martinsen's moment of glory came in the cross-country relay in Grenoble in 1968.
Skari's decision to quit comes in the same month that fellow Norwegian Thomas Alsgaard also announced he was retiring.
Alsgaard is the only cross-country skier to win gold medals at eight top tournaments -- Olympic Games and World Championships -- in a row.
Source: www.eurosport.com
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