January 07, 2017 (Val di Fiemme, Italy) – Canada’s Alex Harvey dropped to 6th overall at the Tour de Ski following his 19th-place finish on the penultimate Stage 6 mass start 15km CL won by Norway’s Martin Johnsrud Sundby, as Russian Sergey Ustiugov’s unprecedented five-race winning streak ended.

Ustiugov captured the silver medal in a photo finish with a pack of seven skiers at 40:42.2. Finland’s Matti Heikkinen secured the final step on the podium at 40:42.8 at +2.8 off the lead.

“It is a tough course and the guys are pretty tired but they dug deep today,” said Ivan Babikov, coach of the Canadian Cross-Country Ski Team at the Tour. “We might have missed it a bit with the skis. We may have gone with something a bit too sticky.

“It was really hard, packed snow and this is a tough course to get the skis right. Ideally you want to have good kick and a fast glide, but it is a gamble on a course this tough. The tracks were firm and icy but there were some sections where there were no tracks and others with powdery snow. We will debrief on it tonight.”

Fellow Canuck, Devon Kershaw, fought his way into the points with a 27th-place finish while American Noah Hoffman placed 30th and Graeme Killick finished 32nd.

Starting the day fourth overall, the 28-year-old Harvey was hungry for bonus seconds available in the intermittent sprints on the course, while staying in the hunt with the leaders. He won the first bonus sprint, but was not able to maintain pace with the front runners.

Near the end Sundby attacked and gapped the leaders for the win and now sits 1:11.9 behind Ustiugov in second place overall. Heikkinen jumped up the overall standings to now sit in 4th behind Switzerland’s Dario Cologna with France’s Maurice Manificat in 5th.

The battle for 3rd overall will perhaps be the most interesting with 4 athletes being separated by just 50 seconds with just the final climb up Alpe Cermis remaining.

Russia’s Ustiugov will have a 72-second lead on Sundby as the seven-race Tour wraps up on Sunday with a punishing 9-kilometre pursuit race that ends with a 425-metre climb straight to the top of Alpe Cermis.

Harvey will begin his final quest for the overall podium, 38 seconds behind Switzerland’s Dario Cologna.

“Alex is a competitive guy and is hungry. He will be in a group of about four guys who are all good climbers,” said Babikov. “Dario is always strong, but anything is possible.”

The spectacular Val di Fiemme track has been kind to Harvey and the Canadian squad over the years. Harvey has two of his Tour de Ski podiums in Val di Fiemme, and also captured a bronze medal on the challenging course when it hosted the 2013 World Championships.

Results here.
Overall here.