Jacobellis’ hard luck career continues
Italy’s Michela Moioli won the gold medal in Olympic women’s snowboardcross today, overtaking American Lindsey Jacobellis about halfway down the course, then beating the rest of the field to the finish line in Pyeongchang, South Korea.
Jacobellis f inished fourth, continuing her hardluck career at theOlympics. Theworld’s most decorated rider, Jacobellishas failedto return to the podium since settling for silver after an illadvised jump in 2006while she was clear in the lead.
Julia Pereira de Sousa Mablieau of France took silver this time. Defending champion Eva Samkova of the Czech Republic got clipped from behind and skidded across the line for bronze.
Jacobellis had about a two-body-length lead on the field when Moioli overtook her on a curve. Samkova drafted behind and pushed Jacobellis out to the edgeof thecourseand, from there, she couldn’t gain any ground. AUSTRIAN TAKES SUPER- G
» Matthias Mayer of Austria won themen’s super-G, breaking Norway’s 16-year grip on the title.
Mayer won the speed race by 0.13 seconds ahead of Beat Feuz of Switzerland, who addedthe silvermedal to his bronze fromdownhill on Thursday.
Defending champion Kjetil Jansrud of Norway was third, 0.18 seconds behind Mayer. It’s Jansrud’s fifth career Olympic medal after getting downhill silver.
Norway hadwon the past fourOlympicmen’s super-G races a streak begun at the 2002 Salt Lake City Olympics.
Aksel Lund Svindal, the 2010 Olympic champion in super-G, placed fifth the day after taking Mayer’s downhill title. CANADAWINS IN HOCKEY » Rene Bourque and Wojtek Wolski each scored twice and Derek Roy had three assists as Canada opened its Olympic campaign with a 5-1 win over Switzerland in Gangneung.
The Canadians chased goalie Leonardo Genoni less than six minutes into the second period after he gave up his fourth goal on 12 shots. VAULTIER REPEATS AS CHAMPION » Pierre Vaultier of France is back atop the Olympic podium in men’s snowboardcross.
Vaultier defended the title he won at the Sochi Games four years ago by overcoming a crash that nearly ended his chances in the semifinals. The 30-yearold Frenchman picked himself up to finish third and move on to the finals, where he led the six-man pack for most of the way down the mountain.
“Crashing into a run and qualifying for the next one is something quite unusual,” Vaultier said.
JarrydHughes ofAustralia took silver, with Regino Hernandez of Spain earning a rare Winter Games medal for his country by taking bronze.
American teammates Nick Baumgartner and Mick Dierdorff advanced to the final but both washed out on a jump and finished well back of the leaders. MORE MEDALS » Ted-Jan Bloemen of Canada won the 10,000meters in speedskating in an Olympic-record time of 12 minutes, 39.77 seconds. Dutchman SvenKramer finished a surprising sixth. He had dominated the distance race at every competition except theOlympics, where he has neverwon it. ... TheU.S. finished fourth in luge team relay, missing a medal by about one-tenth of a second. Germany won the event. ... The most decisive Olympic skeleton champion ever is 23-year- old Yun Sungbin, who had no idea what he was doing on a sled a few years ago and now stands taller than anyone else in the sport.Yunw on in commanding fashion, his fourruntime of 3 minutes ,20.55 seconds coming in 1.63 seconds ahead of silvermedalist Nikita Tregubov of Russia. Most skeleton races are decided by tenths or hundreths of a second.