Bente Skari ©Heinz Ruckemann

November 3, 2003 – When it was over, Norwegian great Bente Skari, who won 14 World Cup races last season en route to her fourth title in five years and added two more World Championships gold medals, said she'd run out of fire.        Skari, who turned 31 in September, announced a short time after Thomas Alsgaard retired that she, too, was done. As you read this, she and her husband, Geir, a former NCAA ski champion for the University of Denver, will be partway through a six-month around-the-world trip, playing tourist. She said they would avoid any ski towns.       

“My willpower and motivation are no longer strong,” she said. In other words, it was almost too easy; after winning the first two races at Worlds in Val di Fiemme, she didn't race again, citing a mystery ailment. She bounced back a short time later, though, sweeping five of the last six World Cups.        By midsummer, she told www.langrenn.com that she was enjoying retirement. “It is nice not having to prioritize and plan every day and step,” she said.        She bowed out with 42 World Cup wins, second to Russian Yelena Vaelbe's 45. But she also left with an individual Olympic gold medal (10K classic gold in 2002), something Vaelbe never got a sniff of.