With two great descents on the Ice River, Sara Hector won the gold medal in the women’s giant slalom from the alpine skiing program at the Beijing 2022 Olympics.
In the first run early this morning, the Swedish skier built a 0.42-second lead over Federica Brignone (Italy), which was enough for her to reach the title. The Italian herself was left with the silver, and the bronze went to Lara Gut-Behrami (Switzerland). The world champion from Cortina d’Ampezzo 2021 was eighth after the first descent, then she was the fastest in the second run and climbed to the bronze. At only 0.08 behind her finished the Austrian Katharina Truppe, who was second after the first run, but made several inaccuracies in the second and was left without a medal.
The top five were closed by the silver medalist from PyeongChang 2018 Ragnhild Mowinckel, who has to wait ten minutes before making her second descent. The delay was due to the need for medical teams to help the American Nina O’Brien, who suffered a heavy crash at the very end of the track. Despite the delay, Norwegian skier Ragnhild Mowinckel made only one minor inaccuracy, but it was enough to cost her a new Olympic medal.
The PyeongChang 2018 champion Mikaela Shiffrin (USA) failed to defend her gold after making a mistake and fell on the fifth door of the first run.
“I pressed well and attacked, but I made a very small mistake on one turn and that made a big difference. The snow here is incredibly pleasant to ride, but also punishes the slightest mistake. As you can see, I suffered in this run”, said Mikaela Shiffrin. “I don’t fall often. I worked hard on the timing of my turns and I didn’t think it would be a problem. It was not a mistake because I was careful and I can be proud of that, but I am definitely disappointed because I was eliminated on the fifth turn of the Olympic Games”, added she.
Similar was the fate of last year’s winner of the small crystal globe in the discipline, Marta Bassino (Italy), who missed two doors earlier. The other big favorite Petra Vlhova (Slovakia) finished only 14th with a delay of 2.46 seconds against the winner.
The women’s alpine skiing program at the Beijing Games continues on Wednesday with a slalom.
