William Poromaa crashed and finished 20th. Gustaf Berglund was 29th, Truls Gisselman 40th and Edvin Anger 42nd.
“It feels clear that it’s not working, I don’t have the form, I don’t have the day… I don’t have what it takes to be at the level I want to be now,” says a dejected Anger after the race.
– I know that perhaps the biggest chance is the relay and that I have to be in shape for us to have something to do with it. Then it gets frustrating. We have to hope for a miracle, he continues.
Anger notices this He’s not the only one on the Swedish team to underperform, and he’s pondering whether he’s prepared optimally. As far as he knows, he says, the best in the Olympics competed at high altitude.
Both Truls Gisselman and Gustaf Berglund had the feeling early in the morning that their bodies were not reacting as they should – and this feeling was the basis for today’s results.
– My legs are not the same as they were a week or two ago. To make it boring and inappropriate, Berglund remarks and reasons like anger that something went wrong during the upload.
He also doesn’t say anything entirely positive about the relay race:
– There is no Norwegian figure skater today who trembles with fear at the Swedish performances …
William Poromaa was the one from the Swedes who still felt that his form was on the rise and that without the crash in which he lost a lot of time it could have been the best race of the season.
National team manager Anders Byström didn’t really have any good answers as to why the Swedish men didn’t do better. However, he wants to wait until after the games to evaluate the upload. It’s not as simple as saying they should have trained at high altitude, he says, pointing to the example of Linn Svahn. The women’s sprint winner hasn’t been at her best all season.
How do you feel before the men’s relay?
– It is clear that of course it would have felt better if we had achieved good results, but at the same time we know that we have a chance in the relay and we will try, me and Anders Högberg (men’s coach) … we will sit down now and think about how to set up the team so that it becomes as good as possible.
In addition to Friday’s four skaters, Johan Häggström and Calle Halfvarsson remain in the squad as alternatives.
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