Jessie Diggins on her greatest career achievements and favorite memory
The achievements Diggins is most proud of go beyond the medals. Instead, she points to her environmental activism at Protect our Winters and her role as a mental health ambassador.
She has spoken openly about her experiences with an eating disorder and said sharing her story has become one of the most meaningful parts of her career.
“If I had felt less alone and isolated at 18, I think I would have asked for help sooner, and I wouldn’t have suffered so much” she shared.
That recognition has fueled her advocacy work: “I can give this gift of ‘you’re not alone.’ There’s nothing wrong with you. You’re not a bad person. If you need to ask for help, that’s okay.”
She says that’s what she hopes to offer the next generation, “because that was something I really, really needed.”
On the competitive side, her proudest race was not one of her 29 World Cup victories or her Olympic gold medal, but the Olympic silver medal performance that reflected Diggins’ grit and determination: the 30 km freestyle in Beijing 2022.
She was struggling with food poisoning at the time and chose to start anyway: “A minute into the race I got tangled, crashed and fell and got back up.”
“Everything had gone wrong and I decided to go after it. I had no business in the escape. And I definitely didn’t feel like skiing alone with a body that was falling apart and getting cramps.”
“But I got to the finish line and it was the biggest battle ever. I was really proud of how deep I had to dig and how positive I had to stay.”
Another favorite memory came much closer to home, during a warm-up lap at the Minnesota World Cup last February. Diggins said she “cried at least a dozen times” as the cheers from her hometown crowd of 20,000 erupted as she skied past.
“It was the coolest moment of my entire career.”
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