Goggia gets gold, and Bjoergen sets Winter Games medals mark
PYEONGCHANG, South Korea — Sofia Goggia refused to let Lindsey Vonn catch her. Or, anyone else.
The Italian skier won the women’s downhill Wednesday, holding off Ragnhild Mowinckel of Norway by 0.09 seconds and Vonn by 0.47 seconds.
“I was really focused — I moved like a samurai,” Goggia said. “Usually, I’m really chaotic, but I wanted to take in every little detail, every particular in the morning. I believed in myself. And then what counts, counts.”
Speaking of counting, Marit Bjoergen has had to do plenty of it during her Olympic career. She became the most-decorated Winter Olympian of all time with 14 career medals, getting the latest when Norway won the bronze in the women’s team sprint in crosscountry skiing.
“When you’re still an athlete you just have focus on other races,” Bjoergen said. “I think I’ll need to have time to myself and look behind me and look how I’ve been able to do this. It’s still hard to understand it when I’m standing here.”
While Bjoergen’s milestone was the highlight, the United States’ victory in the event was its first Olympic gold in women’s cross-country skiing.
Norway won the men’s sprint, giving the country its 13th cross-country medal at the games to tie an Olympic record, and added gold in the men’s speedskating team pursuit with a win over South Korea in the final. Japan beat defending champion the Netherlands in an Olympic record to win the women’s team pursuit, and the U.S. women picked up bronze.
Mariama Jamanka won the women’s bobsled, giving Germany its fifth gold medal in eight sliding events so far at Pyeongchang.
Meanwhile, the Russian athletes are still sitting at zero in the gold medals column. But that number could change soon.
Teen figure skaters Alina Zagitova and Evgenia Medvedeva were in first and second place, respectively, in the women’s short program after earning the highest scores ever. That leaves them both in good position to come up with gold heading into the free skate Friday.
“I was very happy when I saw the score, but I did not expect it,” said the 15-year-old Zagitova, who had 82.92 points. “Now my name will be connected to that record.”
Brady Leman of Canada won the men’s skicross, beating Marc Bischofberger of Switzerland in a wild final — after some scary elimination rounds during which a handful of crashes forced several men to leave the course on medical sleds.
Finland won the bronze in women’s hockey with a 3-2 victory over the Russian team. The gold-medal game between the United States and Canada is Thursday.
At Jeongseon Alpine Center, Goggia was behind on the leaderboard at the top, but sped up near the bottom of the hill. It was enough to keep Vonn just out of reach when she raced two spots later.