STORY AND PHOTO BY KAREN BOSSICK

Sun Valley’s Jake Adicoff and Sam Wood won the men’s visually impaired cross-country sprint Wednesday at the World Championships in Ostersund, Sweden.

Adicoff was neck-and-neck with two other athletes as they raced in a steady rainfall heading into the final turn of the 1.2-kilometer sprint. They successfully avoided a collision between competitors on the straightaway into the finish line, giving them the gold by more than four seconds, according to Kristen Gowdy, writing for U.S. Paralympics Nordic Skiing.

“We had a plan to hammer from the beginning, to go hard and try to catch the groups up front,” Adicoff told Gowdy. “Things got really interesting toward the end, especially with that crash that we were very lucky to avoid. It was exciting to cross the finish line in first.”

The two led a Team USA medal hat trick on Day Three of the weeklong World Championships after winning silver in Sunday’s 18K long-distance cross-country race.

Earlier in the day, Kendall Gretsh of Downers Grove, Ill., took silver in the women’s sitting competition. Sydney Peterson of Lake Elmo, Minn., staged a dramatic comeback in the final meters ski to take bronze in the women’s standing competition.

Boisean Dani Aravich, who has trained in Sun Valley with the Challenged Athlete Foundation, finished sixth after advancing to the finals alongside Peterson. It was her best finish since finishing eighth in a  sprint event at the 2022 Paralympics in Beijing.

This is Adicoff’s second career world title, as he won the middle distance cross-country event at last year’s world championships before heading to the Paralympic Winter Games in Beijing where he won three medals.

“I love this sport,” he told Gowdy. “To continue to have days like this is just the icing on the cake for us.”

Adicoff and Wood will compete in the middle-distance cross-country race on Saturday. They are waiting to see if they will be selected to be part of the Team USA relay team on the final day of competition.