Pellegrino dreams of Italian Olympic medals – with or without him: 'They are ready'
Nov 26, 2025·Cross-Country)
The 2025/2026 Coop FIS Cross-Country World Cup season will mark the end of an era as Italy’s sprint star Federico Pellegrino makes his last races as a professional skier.
The 34-year-old enters his 17th and final winter as an athlete with a mix of excitement, nostalgia and uncertainty over just how long the season will last.
“I’m excited because I really want to see how my preparations have been and what my shape is compared to the other athletes,” Pellegrino said.
“But I also know my professional career will end, and sometimes I’ve felt a little sad or nostalgic. Some tears have come out because I’ve been living many moments as if it were the last time."
Pellegrino made his World Cup debut in 2010 and has since built one of the longest and most consistent careers in modern skiing. In the 2015/2016 season, he became the first non-Scandinavian to win the Sprint World Cup, a feat he repeated five years later. At the 2017 FIS Nordic World Ski Championships, he became sprint world champion, and in addition to his seven World Championship medals, he has won two consecutive Olympic sprint silvers behind Johannes Hoesflot Klaebo (NOR).
The superstar from Sci Club Saint Barthelemy in Aosta, northwestern Italy, has no plans to reconsider retirement.
“Absolutely not,” Pellegrino said.
Life at home has shifted significantly this year. Pellegrino and his wife, cross-country Olympian Greta Laurent (ITA), welcomed their second child, Fabien, in April, a moment that reshaped his perspective on training and travel.
“The second child changed things a little. I have spent more time at home and less at training camps. My wife deserves my time now,” said Pellegrino, who has had young skiers from Italy’s B team coming to his home to train with him ahead of the season to limit his time away.
According to Pellegrino, giving first-born son Alexis a little brother was part of his retirement plan.
“The big step was the first child. The second one, is something that I and my wife decided to put into action before the end of my career, so that I would be sure that my career must have to stop," he said.
He has set his retirement date for February 22, the last day of this season’s highlight: the Milano Cortina 2026 Olympic Games, where he could reach a third consecutive Games podium in front of a home crowd. But Pellegrino does not want to take anything for granted, not even qualifying for the big event. The first half of the World Cup season will also serve as Olympic qualifiers.
“It depends on my legs how long the season will be,” he said.
"If I’m really good, I’ll probably finish in February. If it’s really bad, I might stop before the Olympics."
He has no problem realizing that paving the way for strong Italian cross-country skiers could now come back to challenge him.
“My teammates are truly getting better and better, and it will be harder for me to earn the place,” Pellegrino said.
“But even if I don’t take part in the Olympics, I know Italy can win a medal in the team event. I would be proud of my work helping the next generation believe in themselves.”
Despite his humility, Pellegrino claimed fourth place in the overall World Cup standings last season and performed well in his preseason races in Muonio, Finland, where he was No. 2 in the sprint qualifiers and fifth in the final, also finishing fifth in the 10 km Interval Start Classic.
"I must say that I was a bit surprised with myself,” Pellegrino said.
"If I was not the oldest, I was definitely one of the oldest, and I was good in the sprint prologue.
When it comes to the man to beat this season, it is hard to ignore five-time Olympic champion Klaebo, who left the 2025 Nordic World Ski Championships on home snow in Trondheim, Norway, with six gold medals in six races.
Klaebo won his fifth overall World Cup Crystal Globe and could equal his compatriot Bjoern Daehlie on six after this winter.
But Sweden’s 23-year-old Edvin Anger, last season’s overall runner-up, has said he is better prepared than ever, hoping to give the Norwegian king of cross-country a serious challenge.
“Edvin Anger took a great step forward last year and Klaebo and Anger would be a great mix, but I think athletes like Klaebo and Amundsen (2023/2024 overall winner Harald Oestberg Amundsen) are really complete,” Pellegrino said, adding that Klaebo’s focus on the Olympic Games could open opportunities for others.
Then again, it might not only be Klaebo who prioritizes Milano Cortina 2026 this winter, Pellegrino reflected.
"The Olympic Games in Europe will be a great opportunity for everyone to show their best skiing, so let’s see.
It will be a great season as always.”
And as always, Klaebo and Amundsen are not the only Norwegian favorites for World Cup podiums and Olympic medals. Erik Valnes finished third in last year’s overall World Cup standings, with Simen Hegstad Krueger sixth, Andreas Fjorden Ree eighth and Martin Loewstroem Nyenget ninth.
Hugo Lapalus of France had a strong season, finishing seventh overall and reaching a second consecutive overall Tour de Ski podium. The 27-year-old was the third-best distance skier last winter and will battle with Paul Golberg and the Norwegians already mentioned, as well as Iivo Niskanen (FIN), Mika Vermeulen (AUT), William Poromaa (SWE) and Friedrich Mach (GER) in this season’s longer races.
USA’s 25-year-old Ben Ogden completed the overall World Cup top 10 last season and will look to take further steps forward this winter.
For Pellegrino, racing as much as possible will be essential in his final winter, where he hopes to make full use of his experience from 17 seasons among the world’s best.
“The World Cup is so important because our sport is so particular that you need to have confidence in every kind of snow, skis, wax, tracks, altitude and the many, many weather conditions,” he said.
"The more that you compete, the more confident you can feel in all these fields, and when you have more than 300 World Cup races behind you, you have a good experience of memories, but you need the fresh memories to be really strong in the big events.
He may be Italian, but the Olympic tracks at Val di Fiemme are new for everyone, and Pellegrino had been looking forward to last year’s Tour de Ski as an opportunity to test them. He then delivered his best result of the World Cup season, finishing second in the 20 km Skiathlon, a strong statement ahead of the Olympic Games from the sprint expert, who had never previously reached a World Cup Skiathlon top 30.
“I was never as confident there as last year,” Pellegrino said.
"It was only the fifth Skiathlon of my career, o probably I’d done some calculations wrong in the past, but after that my Skiathlon got good, considering that I was just 20cm far from a World Championships medal (at Trondheim 2025)."
He finished fourth in the Val di Fiemme sprint, won by Klaebo. In the 2026 Tour de Ski, skiers will compete on a new, modified track on the Olympic course, with more climb and a shorter final straight.
“It will be interesting and I’ve got really good vibes from last year’s race,” Pellegrino said.
“But right now the focus is on Ruka and Trondheim, where maybe I can earn the pass to the Olympics.”
Whether he finishes his career in February at Milano Cortina or earlier in the winter, Italy’s main cross-country man knows he will give everything for Italy to win an Olympic medal on home snow, whether racing or standing next to the tracks.
“Even if I wouldn’t take part in the Olympic Games, I am sure that Italy, at the moment, can try to win a medal in the team event, and that is the main goal that I have – it doesn’t matter whether I take part in the race on the team, or not,” he said.
