(Reuters) – Four-times Olympic gold medallist Therese Johaug of Norway announced her retirement from cross-country skiing on Friday, ending a career in which she also amassed 14 world championship gold medals.
Johaug, who missed the Pyeongchang Winter Games in 2018 because she was serving an 18-month doping ban, has also won three overall world cup titles. She earned three of her Olympic titles at the Beijing Winter Games last month.
“I don’t really want the journey to end, but there is a time for everything, and I think the time has come to do other things than compete in cross-country,” she said on Instagram.
The 33-year-old had already announced that the Games in Beijing would be her last Olympics.
Johaug won her first Olympic gold in the 4x5km relay in Vancouver in 2010 and her second, third and fourth more than a decade later.
She won gold in the 10km individual, 15km skiathlon and 30km mass start events at the Beijing Games and also won a bronze and a silver medal at the Sochi Games in 2014.
Johaug tested positive for a banned substance in 2016 and was initially banned for 13 months before her suspension was extended to 18 months by the Court of Arbitration for Sport.
Her last race will be the 30 km in Holmenkollen, Norway on Saturday.
(Reporting by Tommy Lund in Gdansk; Editing by Toby Davis)
