BEIJING (Reuters) -Norway beat the Russian Olympic Committee in the men’s speed skating team pursuit final at the Beijing Olympics on Tuesday, becoming the first country to win two gold medals in the event.
The defending champions whizzed around the National Speed Skating Oval in perfect unison, steadily widening the gap on the Russian team to finish in three minutes and 38.08 seconds.
Norway counts men’s 5,000m bronze medallist Hallgeir Engebraaten, as well as a member of previous winning team Sverre Lunde Pedersen in their ranks.
They roared with delight and thumped one another on the backs when they looked up after crossing the finish line and saw that they had achieved a feat no team had managed before.
The ROC struggled to keep up despite setting an Olympic record in the semis, finishing over two seconds behind in 3:40.46 to take the silver, their first medal in the event.
The United States, world record holders in the event, won the bronze medal, ahead of a Dutch team including individual silver medallist Patrick Roest and speed skating great Sven Kramer.
(Reporting by Sakura Murakami, editing by Ed Osmond & Shri Navaratnam)
