Tears all round as Shiffrin, German skaters claim gold
PYEONGCHANG: Skier Mikaela Shiffrin opened her delayed Olympics with victory and figure skaters Aljona Savchenko and Bruno Massot smashed a world record to grab gold as full competition resumed yesterday after days of wind disruption.
The 22-year-old Shiffrin kicked off her bid for multiple titles at the Pyeongchang Winter Games with a storming second run in the giant slalom, ending a nervous wait after it was postponed because of high winds on Monday.
The Sochi 2014 slalom champion from America sank to her knees and dissolved in tears after her powerful descent brought her gold from Norway’s Ragnhild Mowinckel by 0.39 seconds.
“I don’t know how to explain it. It’s crazy. There’s so much emotion,” Shiffrin said.
“To come to the Olympics after some tough races on the World Cup circuit and to charge like that — I risked it on the second run — it’s super-cool.”
Earlier, Aksel Lund Svindal, 35, became the Olympics’ oldest alpine ski champion in the men’s downhill, with Kjetil Jansrud completing a Norwegian one-two.
Svindal, coming to the end of a stellar career, clocked 1min 40.25sec down the 3km Jeongseon course to hand Norway its first Olympic downhill gold.
“It feels pretty good, I’m extremely happy,” said Svindal. “World Cup wins, I’ve been there a few times and know how that feels, but this is different.”
The Germans Savchenko and Massot were in floods of tears after they won the pairs figure skating by a whisker ahead of China’s Sui Wenjing and Han Cong, the strong favourites who missed out after Sui took a tumble.
After an error in the short programme, hopes had faded for Savchenko and Massot but they scored 159.09 points in the free dance, breaking their own world record, to pull off a fairytale victory.
‘WRITING HISTORY’
To roars from the crowd, French-born Massot then lifted Ukrainian-born Savchenko onto the top step of the podium. Meagan Duhamel and Eric Radford of Canada took bronze.
“I was positive after yesterday. I said to Bruno, we will write history today. And then everything happened as I had imagined it and it came true,” Savchenko said.
North Korean duo Ryom Tae Ok and Kim Ju Sik, supported strongly by their country’s all-female cheering squad and the home South Korean crowd, scored a personal best total of 193.63.
“I was very nervous about the competition, but once we went in, the sight of our cheer squad and the southern countrymen cheering together offered great support and stimulation,” said Kim.
Frenchman Pierre Vaultier retained his snowboard cross title and Norway’s Ragnhild Haga won the women’s 10km crosscountry race.
In biathlon, Norway’s Johannes Thingnes Boe won the men’s 20km and Hanna Oeberg of Sweden triumphed in the wind-rescheduled women’s 15km. Norwegian skier Ragnhild Haga won the women’s 10km cross-country.
Canada’s Ted-Jan Bloemen broke a Dutch stranglehold on the speed skating titles with victory in the 10,000m, clocking a Games-record 12mins 39.77sec.
And Germany won a thrilling team relay to finish the luge competition with three out of four golds and extend their lead at the top of the overall medals table with nine, ahead of Norway on six.