Graabak started skiing at the age of twelve and started Nordic combined a year later. He completed his first competitions on an international level at the Junior World Championships in 2009, where he finished 20th in the individual competition in the victory of Italian Alessandro Pittin . At the Junior World Championships in the following winter he reached tenth place and won the silver medal behind the German team with the team around Ole Christian Wendel , Gudmund Storlien and Truls Sønstehagen Johansen . After he achieved several podium results in the Continental Cup at the beginning of the 2010/11 season, he made his debut in the World Cup in January 2011 , but missed the top 30 points in his six appearances this winter. He achieved such a result for the first time in December 2011: after two 28th place in the Ramsau he made the jump on the podium a week later at the World Cup in Seefeld with the fastest time in third behind Jason Lamy Chappuis and Alessandro Pittin. With these results, the then 20-year-old Graabak firmly established himself in the Norwegian World Cup team, and in the further course of the winter he achieved two further podium results, including a World Cup victory with Jan Schmid , Magnus Moan and Mikko Kokslien in the relay. Overall, he was at the end of the season in 16th place in the overall World Cup .
Graaak at the World Cup in Ramsau 2016
In the following season, Graabak achieved multiple top 10 results as well as two World Cup victories in the relay and in the team sprint. Better results mostly failed due to his weakness in jumping, after this sub-discipline the Norwegian was often far behind and had to improve in the classification through good mileage. At the season highlight of winter 2012/13, the Nordic World Ski Championships in Val di Fiemme, Graabak was more than three minutes behind the top after jumping in 49th place and could not place in the top 30 even with the eleventh best mileage. At the same time he won the silver medal behind the French team at this world championship with the team. The Olympic winter 2013/14 began for him with a second place behind Eric Frenzel in the individual and the victory with the Norwegian team in the team competition at the season opening in Kuusamo , he also finished single-digit ranks in other World Cup races. He only missed the top ten at one of eight World Cups and at his last pre-Olympic start in the Nordic Combined Triple . With these results he qualified for the five-man Norwegian Olympic team of combined athletes .
At the Olympic Games in Sochi , Graabak was not used in the first individual competition on the normal hill, but in the competition on the large hill, where he replaced his teammate Mikko Kokslien. Here the Norwegian initially jumped to sixth place, but made up his starting deficit of 42 seconds early and secured the gold medal in the finish sprint ahead of his teammate Magnus Moan. This victory was also Graabak's first success at an FIS individual competition at international level, which is why it was considered a surprise. The training to prepare for this success is precisely documented and indicates that the Norwegian Association gave it a realistic chance. With his triumph, he became the first Norwegian since Bjarte Engen Vik to win an Olympic gold medal in 1998.
In the 2014/15 season , the reigning Olympic champion achieved his first World Cup victory when he beat Bernhard Gruber and Fabian Rießle in a close race in Val di Fiemme, Italy . After winning one competitions with the team and two competitions in the team sprint, he went to the 2015 World Championships in Falun as a medal favorite . There he finally won the silver medal behind the German relay team with the team. In the 2015/16 World Cup , Graabak started with a number of placements among the top ten. After just missing the podium four times in fourth place, Graabak triumphed at the home World Cup in Trondheim . At the end of the season in Schonach he was able to repeat this success and finish the season fourth in the overall ranking.
In the 2018/19 World Cup season , Graabak won his fifth World Cup race in Ramsau at the end of December . A few weeks later he also celebrated his fourteenth team success by winning the team sprint in Val di Fiemme. With his second win of the season in Lahti behind him, Graabak traveled to the 2019 Nordic World Ski Championships in Seefeld . There he became team world champion together with Espen Bjørnstad , Jan Schmid and Jarl Magnus Riiber. He finished the season in seventh place in the overall World Cup standings and won the mass start and team sprint at the 2019 Norwegian Championships .
↑ His training from 2010 to 2014 was analyzed in detail: Rasdal V, Moen F, Sandbakk Ø. The Long-Term Development of Training, Technical, and Physiological Characteristics of an Olympic Champion in Nordic Combined. Front Physiol. 2018; 9: 931. Published 2018 Jul 13. doi: 10.3389 / fphys.2018.00931 ; up Jan. 3, 2019
Norway
Val di Fiemme
Schonach
Ramsau
Lahti
Chaux-Neuve
Sochi 2014
Pyeongchang 2018
2015 Falun
