On Thursday, the Norwegian Ski Association announced that Anne Kjersti Kalvå had to cancel the Tour de Ski after testing positive for covid-19. Now national team doctor Ove Ferangen reports that Martin Løwstrøm Nyenget has also tested positive. – He tested negative the day he was here. He took a test yesterday and it was positive. Kalvå tested positive for corona after the competition in Oberstdorf yesterday and traveled home to Trondheim today. Trønder was third in the summary, 1.31 minutes behind Sweden’s Frida Karlsson. – She took it quite hard. She was sad and disappointed. It is natural when you are in such good shape and are taken out of the game, and you also have bad memories from last year, says national team coach Stig Rune Kveen to news. According to the national team’s media contact, Gro Eide, Kalvå does not want to speak to the media on Thursday. SAME COHORT: Tiril Udnes Weng and Anne Kjersti Kalvå after finishing the 20 km hunt start. Photo: Terje Pedersen / NTB Tests every day Kveen confirms that Kalvå tested positive in a routine test that was taken before the athletes were to move from Oberstdorf to Val di Fiemme on Wednesday afternoon. The women’s cross-country coach Sjur Ole Svarstad also tested positive for corona on Monday. – We had a testing regime after the high infection rates around us. After we had the one case of infection, we have intensified it even more. Now everyone is tested every day, every morning, national team doctor Ove Ferangen tells news – We are continuing our strict measures with small cohorts, masks and good hand hygiene. Everyone has fixed seats in a fixed car, fixed table positions and we have our own dining rooms, says cross-country manager of the Norwegian Ski Association Espen Bjervig to news. – A covid infection takes some time. Ferangen hopes Kalvå will soon return to training: – Now we have very close contact with her throughout, both from the health team and the trainers who are very close to her. So we will make sure that this goes as smoothly as possible and that she will eventually come back in the same form as she has shown earlier in the season. – How soon can she come back? – It is very difficult to say. We see that a covid infection takes some time. Now most of us have had it a round before. In terms of experience, it seems that round two goes a lot better than the first time you had an infection. And we hope it will do so now. The fear became reality The coronavirus also put an end to Kalvå’s Olympic participation in Beijing last year. – I’m terrified of that covid, I’ll admit it. There is a trauma that lies there, Kalvå told news before Christmas. Since then, Kalvå has stepped up to the top world elite with two podium places and a number of strong results in the World Cup this season, which makes her a medal candidate in the WC in Planica in February. – First of all, it is very boring. She has had the season of her life, says news’s commentator Torgeir Bjørn. – Now there will be unrest and anxiety in the squad, especially among those who have been closest to her, predicts Bjørn. Kalvå has lived alone, but is in a cohort with all the other Norwegian cross-country women. And has had close contact with Tour leader Frida Karlsson, among others. – It’s a bit of a flashback to last season, where the first thing you do when you get up is think about whether you’re healthy. Now the athletes will feel it, says Bjørn. Heidi Weng, who had her Olympic dream crushed together with Kalvå, has had a particularly tough time during the corona years and the time afterwards. When national team coach Sjur Ole Svarstad contracted the corona virus on Monday, the old thoughts came back for Weng. – It is clear that it has been a long and tough year for me. There has been something pretty much the whole time, if you get another downturn now, it would be crazy, Weng told news after Wednesday’s start of the hunt. HUG: Two days ago, Kalvå and Tour leader Karlsson hugged. Photo: Terje Pedersen / NTB Hoping for a mild variant Kveen did not perceive Kalvå, who finished fourth in yesterday’s 20 km hunt start, as ill. He’s crossing his fingers that it’s a mild version she’s got. – She has had it before, and then I hope – even though I am not a doctor – that it will take less time before she is back, that it will not be so severe, he says. As the new national team coach, Kveen has been an important supporter for Kalvå through what was a difficult spring after the previous round with covid. He promises that the student will receive close follow-up this time as well: – I’m not too worried about it. We must recreate what we have and look forward. She has shown how good she is, so we can only cross our fingers that she is back soon. Kveen says he cannot answer whether the rest of the team is worried after first coach Sjur Ole Svarstad and then Anne Kjersti Kalvå tested positive during the Tour de Ski. – We do what we can to avoid infection. We test ourselves often and try to be as good as we can. We will then be aggressive with the runners we have and prepare as best we can for the final stages, he says.
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Anne Kjersti Kalvå’s corona nightmare repeated – sent home from Tour de Ski – news Sport – Sports news, results and broadcasting schedule
