Diggins completes hat-trick of Tour de Ski titles: ‘By far my best ever’
Jan 04, 2026·Cross-Country)
Jessie Diggins (USA) won her third Tour de Ski title on Sunday, capping the six-stage Tour with a podium in the Women’s Mass Start 10km Free at the Coop FIS Cross-Country World Cup in Val di Fiemme, Italy.
The 34-year-old defending champion retained her title by a comfortable margin, with No.2 in the Overall Tour de Ski standings, Austria’s Teresa Stadlober, finishing more than two minutes and 17 seconds behind.
Two-time Tour de Ski champion Heidi Weng claimed third place in the Overall standings, finishing 2:31.6 behind the winner.
”It’s a really cool feeling,” said Diggins, who will retire from Cross-Country after this season.
The victory makes the Minnesota skier the third most successful woman in the Tour’s 20-year history.
Only Norway’s Therese Johaug and Poland’s Justyna Kowalczyk, with four titles each, have won it more times.
”The Tour de Ski is one of the hardest things to win,” said Diggins, who won Olympic Team Sprint gold at the PyeongChang 2018 Olympic Winter Games with Kikkan Randall (USA).
The veteran, whose first Tour victory came five years ago, thanked her team for the victory.
”I felt like I had awesome skis that were super competitive, every single day, and that really matters,” Diggins said.
”It takes everyone coming together to make it happen and we have such an amazing staff working so hard to support us. It takes a village (to raise a child) and I’m really proud and grateful for my village. It’s so fun to feel good on this last Tour.”
Before Sunday’s grand finale, Diggins had a comfortable lead of one minute and 19 seconds ahead of runner-up Jasmin Joensuu (FIN), with Moa Ilar of Sweden in third place, 1:38 behind.
But no one got close on Sunday as Diggins refused to slow down, even when the race known as the Final Climb entered its steep final uphill section up the Alpine ski slope of Alpe Cermis.
With 2.5km left to ski – most of it uphill – Diggins was in fifth place, 2.8 seconds behind leader Karoline Simpson-Larsen of Norway, who was on her way to the second World Cup victory of her career.
Coming into the last 500m, she was fourth, 17.6 seconds behind the leader. The American superstar then managed to make a last push at a stage of the Tour where most tanks are empty, beating Weng and Stadlober to claim the second place by 5.6 seconds.
”I was trying to be smart and safe in terms of the overall Tour, but when it was safe enough, I thought, ‘right, now I can empty the tank’,” Diggins said.
Feeling at home in the Alpine slopes, USA’s Women’s Alpine skiing team had come to cheer for their Cross-Country queen.
”It’s so cool,” Diggins said.
”We had such an amazing cheering out there, it was so cool. Just feeling so much love across different sports has been really awesome."
Diggins won two of the Tour’s six stages, making it to the podium in four. Apart from her victories – in the 20km Pursuit Classic and the Tour-debuting 5km Heat Mass Start Free – and Sunday’s second place, she finished third in Toblach’s 10km Interval Start Classic.
Her other two results were a fourth place in the Sprint Free in Toblach and a seventh place in Saturday’s Sprint Classic in Val di Fiemme. Winning Tour de Ski is all about consistency, according to the three-time champion.
”The biggest challenge is just that you have to stay focused and on, and be able to turn that off and on every day,” said Diggins, who finished second behind Stadlober in the Climber standings, and was fourth in the Sprint standings.
”It’s 10 days when you just have to be with it, and you have to keep pulling together, maybe not A+ performances but at least B+ performances, day after day after day, and it’s hard.
Having completed the Tour – and its gruesome last climb – for the last time added some extra emotions to the victory.
”I’m done – forever. And it was an awesome Tour,” she said.
The victory gives Diggins another 300 World Cup points, increasing her lead in the Overall standings. Diggins now has 1,216 points – 184 more than Sweden’s Moa Ilar in second place. But before thinking about a third consecutive Overall Crystal Globe, Diggins is off to her fourth and last Olympic Winter Games. In just a month’s time, she will be back in Val di Fiemme for the Milano Cortina 2026 Olympic Winter Games, hoping to build on her good shape this winter.
”It’s really great,” Diggins said about her form.
”It’s nice to know that all the training is working and that all the works with the wax techs is also working.
Sweden’s Ebba Andersson finished in fourth place in the Overall Tour de Ski standings, two minutes and 41.1 seconds behind Diggins. Norway’s Julie Bjervig Drivenes finished fifth, beating Johanna Matintalo of Finland in sixth place by 2.3 seconds, Simpson-Larsen, making it three Norwegians among the Tour’s seven best.
Ilar, Joensuu and Dariya Nepryaeva (AIN) completed the Overall top 10.
The next World Cup stage is in Oberhof, Germany, 17-18 January.
Click here for full results from the Women’s 10km Mass Start Free, here for the Women’s Overall Tour de Ski standings, here for the Women’s World Cup standings and here to follow FIS Cross-Country on Youtube.
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