Jessie Diggins capped off a historic week by taking second place in the final climb and winning the overall title at the 2025–26 Tour de Ski, marking the third time in her career that the Stifel U.S. Ski Team star has claimed victory in cross country's most prestigious stage race.

On the men’s side, Gus Schumacher delivered a breakthrough performance for the Stifel U.S. Ski Team, finishing 16th and securing seventh overall in the Tour de Ski. Schumacher’s result stands as the best overall finish by an American man in the history of the event, surpassing the previous mark of 13th set by Ben Ogden at the 2022–23 Tour de Ski.

“I'm psyched,” said Schumacher. “My goal was to get top 10 coming in and it was nice to have a solid tour with some like really bright spots with the 5k.”

Diggins took the overall win by two minutes and 17 seconds, and only added to her lead on the iconic Final Climb up Alpe Cermis, a brutal uphill pursuit. The climb begins in the Val di Fiemme stadium before ascending straight up a ski resort, featuring gradients that reach up to 28 percent—comparable in steepness to Killington Resort’s Outer Limits or Deer Valley’s Champion trail. In her final appearance on the famed climb, Diggins once again proved her combination of endurance, power and tactics.

"We had such amazing help from so many people, such great cheering today," said Diggins. "We've had an amazing team vibe, great energy and I've had great skis every day of the tour and it really takes everything from everyone to make it happen and so I'm just so thankful for my team. It was so fun to close it down with a good one today and it'll be a great team celebration tonight!

It was Diggins’ final Tour de Ski title, as she announced her retirement from the World Cup after the 2025-26 season. Her win continues to solidify her legacy as one of the greatest cross country skiers in U.S. history—and one of the sport’s defining athletes of her generation.

"Honestly, the Tour de Ski is one of the hardest things to win," said Diggins. "When we won the Olympics, it's amazing, it's really special, but that's one race and the Tour is day after day after day after day after day. You have to put it together back to back, you have to be on, and you have to keep together under cumulative pressure and that is really hard. It's hard on you and it's hard on the team and I am so proud of the team for winning."

Behind Schumacher and Diggins, Ogden was 22nd and Zak Ketterson 35th in the 10k to finish 25th and 36th in the overall standings, respectively. Julia Kern took an impressive 14th on the day and 17th overall in the Tour de Ski, besting her previous 20th place overall Tour de Ski result.

The 2025-26 Tour de Ski opened in Toblach, Italy, with four stages before concluding in Val di Fiemme for the final two stages. Val di Fiemme will also serve as a host venue for cross country skiing at the upcoming Milano Cortina Olympic Winter Games, adding further significance to the Stifel U.S. Ski Team’s strong performance on Olympic terrain.

RESULTS
Women’s 10k mass start skate
Men’s 10k mass start skate

Women’s overall
Men’s overall  

If there is any place on the World Cup circuit that feels more like home for Jessie Diggins, outside of Minneapolis, MN, it's Toblach, Italy. Today, on her final day of racing in Toblach for the fourth stage of the Tour de Ski, Diggins did what she does best - win.

In her 14th Tour de Ski, Diggins is walking away from her favorite course on the circuit with her 32nd victory and 85th podium. Of those 85 podiums and 32 wins, 15 of them have been right here in Toblach and eight of those have been victories. Toblach was the first place Diggins has ever won a race, dating back to 2016. Today, she did just that, for the second time in two days. 

"Honestly, it's the year of dreams coming true. This venue is so special to me and a place of so many amazing memories since my first Tour in 2012. It's really cool, and I am so thankful to everyone here. It was a hard race, it was a lonely race, but I was pushing hard and wanting to leave it all out on the course and fight for every second while remaining efficient."

Today's race format did not favor Diggins. Due to the nature of the pursuit race, each athlete pursues the leader of the Tour, which happens to be Diggins. Meaning she started 1 minute and 10 seconds ahead of the second-place start, Moa Ilar of Sweden. The entire race, Diggins was alone. 

Behind her, Sweden’s Ilar and Austria’s Teresa Stadlober emerged as the primary chasers. The pair worked together to manage the gap, sharing the workload across the flats and climbs, but the deficit continued to grow. Midway through the race, Diggins had stretched her lead well beyond a minute, with the rest of the field trailing even farther back as sunlight settled over the Toblach course.

"You know, every Tour i've done, there is always one day where I go, 'this is the day you have to be so gritty... if you want to win the Tour, you have to make it happen now.' And so I went in with that mindset. Sometimes I don't like how it feels to feel that much pressure but I know I perform well under it, so I just said to myself , ‘If you want to win the Tour, today is your day to be gritty." 

"I believed in my team, my skis were perfect, I would change nothing with the skis, and so a huge kudos to them. This was a win for the truck and the coaches and really the credit goes to them, because to have a good race on this course where you have to have really good kick and fast glide, you have to have the best of both worlds."

Going into Val di Fiemme and the final two races, Diggins has a sizable lead in the Tour de Ski standings, with 1 minute and 30 seconds ahead of Ilar of Sweden. With Norway's Astrid Slind, who was second in the overall standings, dropping out of the Tour due to sickness, Diggins' path is more straightforward as we enter the next two stages. 

"I am taking it day by day. But I am excited because it's going to be the Olympic courses, it's a new sprint course, new for everyone, and the thing for me is learning learning learning. I am here to learn, take notes, improve, get in lifetime reps, and just see this as a growth opportunity. And that plan has not changed. Tour lead or no Tour lead. That's the mindset I have going into Val di Fiemme." 

Off the race course, there was a moment after the win that marked something even more meaningful for Diggins. A place that has followed her journey from breakthrough athlete to one of the sport’s all-time greats, Diggins was honored after the race by having one of the bridges on the course named after her. "Jessie Bridge" is officially a part of the Toblach World Cup venue. 

The eventual podium for the women's race was led by Diggins, with Ilar in second and Austria's Stadlober in third. Julia Kern was 18th. 

For the men, Gus Schumacher shone once again. After his victory in yesterday's 5k skate, he was among a strong chase group behind the Tour leader, and eventual winner of the day, Norway's Johannes Hoesflot Klaebo. Schumacher played the game today, trading off leading the group, then falling behind to take on the draft on the high-speed downhills. It was a race of tactics, and Schumacher played it well. Into the stadium, it was an all-out sprint to the finish. Across the line, he was in a photo-finish for fourth, fifth and sixth, but ultimately was placed sixth. He now sits third overall in the Tour de Ski standings, going into stage five in Val di Fiemme. The day was won by Klaebo, with second place going to Norway's Mattis Stenshagen and third was Sweden's Edvin Anger. Ben Ogden was the next American finisher in 29th. 

Tomorrow, the athletes will check out the Olympic Winter Games venue and the updated sprint course, with the fifth stage, the classic sprint going down on Jan. 3. 

RESULTS
Women
Men

TOUR DE SKI STANDINGS
Women
Men

History doesn’t always arrive in a single decisive moment. Sometimes it reveals itself through patience, teamwork and the ability to give it your all and wait for the result. That was the case on Wednesday at the Tour de Ski, where the final times from the 5k skate heat mass start told a story far bigger than any one race.

For the first time in history, an American man and an American woman won a cross country World Cup on the same day. Gus Schumacher and Jessie Diggins delivered a milestone result for the Stifel U.S. Ski Team, both winning the 5k mass start, heat, event for the third stage of the Tour de Ski. 

Diggins continued to build on her already legendary resume, earning her 31st World Cup victory and 84th career podium. Schumacher matched the moment on the men’s side, capturing his second career World Cup win and third podium. Together, their results also marked the 25th World Cup podium for the Stifel U.S. Cross Country Ski Team in Toblach alone, underscoring a long and meaningful history of American success at this venue. 

Both victories came in a brand-new format: a 5k skate contested in four staggered heats, with final results determined purely by time.

It was the first time in many years that the World Cup featured a 5k skate, and the hybrid nature of the event—blending sprint speed with distance endurance—reshaped the way athletes approached the race. Winning was no longer about position alone, but about committing to pace, efficiency and collective decision-making within each heat, and between all nations. 

For Diggins, that collaborative element became one of the most defining and enjoyable parts of the day. 

“What I thought was so cool and fun was feeling the camaraderie,” she said. 'I was talking to all the girls beforehand and was saying, ‘team number three, we’re going to do this! And we’re going to go fast and change leads… and when I go out first and blow up, you can go.' We had really great teamwork out there and I think that is why we had a really fast heat. It was fun to feel that excitement with other countries and friends from the World Cup. Maybe that wasn’t the goal to get teamwork across countries, but for me, that was the goal.”

“I think this is a distance that suits me,” Schumacher said. “It was so fast, so fun and my group was working together really well, which made it fun.” The collaboration wasn’t accidental. “The other guys and I talked about our strategy before the race, and truly, I was impressed by how responsive they all were. The goal was to make the whole heat a lot faster by how hard we went out—and it worked.”

Across the day, that shared understanding echoed through each heat - it was all about producing the fastest possible time.  In several heats, athletes worked together, trading leads to maintain speed without unnecessary effort before the climbs, then committing even more fully as the course began to descend. This was evident in both Diggins' and Schumacher's heats, where at each time check, a different athlete was leading the pack. In an event that is so short and fast, timing was everything, and so were calculated movements. 

Schumacher’s winning heat showcased just how high that bar was. Off the gun, Schumacher was quick. Setting the pace that did not slow. Knowing the other heats were finishing in under 10 minutes, he knew he had to do so. With the coaches and wax technicians out on course with whiteboards writing down splits, the entire U.S. team knew where they were in their heat. Across the finish line, though, Schumacher may have won, but he needed to wait for two more heats to race before knowing the final result. For Diggins, the sentiment was the same - hurry up and wait. 

Beyond the racing itself, Diggins was quick to credit the team behind the scenes. 

“Huge congratulations to all of the wax techs,” she said. “Today’s win was a huge part thanks to them.” She also shared in the significance of the moment on the men’s side. “I am also so proud of Gus and so excited for him. He works so hard and really deserves this.”

“I think it’s super cool,” he said when asked what it meant to make history alongside Diggins. “Jessie had to be a huge favorite today, so it was up to us to hold up our end,” he added with a laugh.

The historic double victory carried meaning well beyond the podium. Diggins and Schumacher stood as the first American woman and man to win the same World Cup event on the same day. That momentum extended down the results sheet, with Julia Kern finishing 10th, her first top-10 result of the season, Ben Ogden in 20th and JC Schoonmaker in 29th. Jessie Diggins continues her sizable lead in the Tour de Ski overall standings. Schumacher now sits in sixth overall. 

Tomorrow, the fourth stage will be the 20k pursuit, where athletes chase the overall leaders of the Tour de Ski based on their time behind the overall leader. 

RESULTS
Women
Men

Tour de Ski Standings 
Women
Men