… on winning a Bronze medal in the women’s cross-country freestyle sprint; and to teammate Rosie Brennan who came in close behind in fourth. The featured photo for this post (via Twitter @pegmcshinn) shows a blurry Diggins in the center just crossing the finish line with Brennan right behind. Diggins was maybe 1/4-second behind Silver medalist Maja Dahlqvist.

Don’t let the expression in this photo fool you- that’s an expression of awe, not surprise. This is Diggins’ first individual medal at the Olympics, and the first individual Olympic medal by any US woman in the sport of cross-country skiing.

Best wishes to Jessie, Rosie, and everyone on the US Ski Team for all the work done over the years to get to where they are today. The medals are what we spectators notice, but the payoff is in their lives before and after the roar of the crowd.

And by the way, the panda trophies are kind of cute: