| The National

At the age of 40, Ole Einar Bjoerndalen has more Olympic and world championship medals than birthdays.

The Norwegian on Wednesday became the most-decorated Winter Games athlete when he won his 13th medal, a gold in the biathlon mixed relay at the Sochi Games.

The Norwegian, who made his World Cup debut in 1994, moved ahead of compatriot and cross-country skier Bjorn Daehlie’s record of 12.

He has 52 medals in world championships and Olympics, and has now matched Dahlie’s Winter Games record of eight golds.

After almost two years without an individual win, Bjoerndalen would have been forgiven for relying on the relays to add to his tally here since Norway, with Bjoerndalen in their ranks every time, have won all five world championships and Olympic relays since 2009.

Yet the soft-spoken Bjoerndalen started his Sochi campaign with gold in the 10km sprint.

Yesterday, he made no mistake on the shooting range to help Norway win the first Olympic mixed relay.

Bjoerndalen, taking part in his sixth Games, looks set to continue his harvest; Norway are the favourites to win Saturday’s relay.

His attitude is his greatest asset, according to Liv Grete, a seven-time world champion and three-time Olympic medallist, who was in the same sports school as Bjoerndalen in the early 1990s.

“We were training a lot together and we made the Norwegian team together. It was a lot of training and a lot of hard work,” Grete said.

Hard work quickly paid off for Bjoerndalen, who claimed his first World Cup win in 1996.

“At 15, he was already a professional, he was already way ahead of all the others in the way he was comprehending the sport,” Grete said.

“You have to have a huge respect for what he’s achieved, keeping the same motivation for 20 years … People just cannot imagine the amount of motivation it takes.” Martin Fourcade, twice a gold-medallist at these games, said Bjoerndalen was more than a role mode and “more of an idol” until he finally caught up to him.

“Time has no hold on his desire to compete and his motivation,” Fourcade said. “Although his results are far from his usual standards, he does not seem to wear down and still has the hunger of a young wolf,” he said.

“He keeps reinventing himself. That is why I admire him so much.”

Bjoerndalen’s capacity to maintain focus is also a huge asset.

“My best memory of him is when he won the 10km sprint at the Nagano Games,” Grete said. “He was leading and the race had been cancelled. Well, he still won it the day after.”

Russia’s men’s hockey team ‘empty inside’ after failure in quarter-finals to Finland

The plans by Russia’s president Vladimir Putin for a golden finish to the Sochi Olympics were ruined Wednesday night when Finland claimed a party-pooping victory over the hosts of the Winter Games in the men’s ice hockey competition.

Russia may yet finish top of the Sochi medal table, but that haul will not include gold in the sport that matters most to the country.

Finland’s clinical 3-1 quarter-final victory in front of a devastated capacity crowd at the Bolshoy Ice Dome will leave the most expensive Olympics without the show-stopping climax that Russians had ached for.

The men’s hockey gold medal will be the last decided in Sochi, handed out hours before Sunday’s closing ceremony.

“I cannot explain my feelings. Inside I am absolutely empty,” said Pavel Datsyuk, the Russia captain. “The emotion we feel right now is disappointment that we didn’t live up to the hopes placed on us.”

Russia’s ice hockey gold drought has now been extended to six Olympics after they also lost in the quarter-finals in 2010.

Putin had taken great interest in the Sochi team, suiting up for a practice session with the players and watching from the Bolshoy stands when Russia took on old Cold War rival the United States in a preliminary-round clash that was hyped as a rematch of the 1980 Lake Placid “Miracle on Ice” won by a team of US college boys. When Ilya Kovalchuk opened the scoring in the first period against Finland the futuristic arena exploded in joy. But by the time Mikael Granlund had tallied in the second to put Finland 3-1 up it seemed as if the life had been sucked out of the Bolshoy.

“I just feel empty, disappointed and empty inside,” said Sergei Bobrovski, the Russia goalie.

“It’s hard to say whether this is a maximal or minimal failure. Failure is failure. How can you measure it?”

Russia’s players were on a gold-medal mission to restore the country’s hockey honour. Now, the best they can do is seventh.

At the age of 40, Ole Einar Bjoerndalen has more Olympic and world championship medals than birthdays. The Norwegian became the most-decorated Winter Games athlete when he won his 13th medal, a gold in the biathlon mixed relay at the Sochi Games.