Nordic World Championships - Nordic Combined Team Competition

The team competition in the nordic combined discipline - which mixes ski jumping in the morning with a 4 x 5km cr0ss-country skiing relay race in the afternoon - went to Norway, whose athletes were peerless on both the hill and the trails. With a monstrous 136.5 meter jump in the morning, Petter Tande put the Norwegian quartet in first place over Austria and a surprising U.S. team. The strong German team was in fifth, just behind a disappointing Finnish team. After the points accumulated in the ski jumping event were translated into staggered starts on the cross-country race, the Norwegians started the relay with a 19 second lead over Austria, which in turn had 17 seconds on the U.S.

Once on the ski trails, the four Norwegians raced well, and maintained their lead over all four legs of the relay. Anchorman Kristian Hammer kept a slim 7-second lead alive over this final leg of the race and gave the Norwegian team the gold. Fading badly, the U.S. team slipped from third to fifth. On the other hand, Germany's team flew over the trails, catching not only the U.S. but also Finland (which ended the event in fourth) and Austria. German anchorman Ronny Ackermann slipped over the finish line just ahead of the Austrian Felix Gottwald, giving the Germans the silver.

(Full coverage on Yahoo!, the Oberstdorf championships website, and Eurosport.)