🥇Shiffrin wins alpine skiing gold in women’s slalom
Mikaela Shiffrin is the Olympic champion! She has banished the demons of Beijing 2022 and is back at the top again. She crouches down after crossing the finish line. Shock? Disbelief? Pride? And then a hug from her mother.
It has been 12 years since her first Olympic gold in slalom which makes it the longest gap between individual golds in the same event at the Winter Games. She has failed to medal in nine of her 11 Olympic races (all events) since that Sochi slalom win.
Switzerland’s Camille Rast takes silver and Anna Swenn-Larsson of Sweden takes bronze.
Key events
Women’s snowboarding slopestyle final: And here comes Murase, her hair flying behind her. It’s good! She gets hugs from Fukada and Morgan who are waiting at the bottom. She waits for the judges, goggles down – but it is only enough for (provisional) silver. One rider to come – Zoi Sadowski Synnot.
Women’s snowboarding slopestyle final: three riders left, one of them the woman currently in second place, Kokomo Murase.
Women’s snowboarding slopestyle final: what a shame for Ally Hickman, who fizzes down the course with style but doesn’t land her final jump. She puts her head in her hand as she rolls down the hill and pulls off her mittens in disgust. Gets a big round of applause.
Women’s snowboarding slopestyle final: back to the Livigno Snow Park, where the riders are still struggling to pick up speed on the snow. We’re in the final run and Mari Fukada has increased her lead with an 87.83 display.
A win for Britain’s men in the curling
Men’s curling: Moat polishes off the end, to give GB a 9-2 lead. And the US decide to shake hands. Team GB finish the round-robin with five wins, four losses, and must wait on results.
That means Italy or Norway losing today and tomorrow’s games.
Men’s curling: the US have pulled two back and we’re into the sixth end. Bruce Mouat stares into the distance before sending a perfect stone into the house to send two US stones spinning away. He permits himself a shy little smile.
Women’s snowboarding slopestyle final: Kokomo Murase can’t improve on her first run either, losing balance in the air and slipping sideways into the snow.
A great run by New Zealander Zoi Sadowski-Synnott, including a “double cork”. It pleases Ed and Tim, but the judges remain unmoved. It’s an improvement on her first run, but she remains fourth.
So, with one run to come, it’s a Japanese one and two, for Fukada and Murase, with Germanys’ Morgan in third.
Bad snow conditions for the women’s slopestyle
Women’s snowboarding slopestyle final: Lots of talk about the conditions, here is an expert view on why they are tricky “the huge amount of fresh snow yesterday has caused problems. They can compact it down but from very cold temperatures of -6 overnight, it suddenly started warming up and melting, and wet fresh snow creates a lot of friction.”
Got that? Good.
Women’s snowboarding slopestyle final: poor Ally Hickman faceplants the snow on her way down. The ski doctor team are alongside quickly, checking her ribs. She is, I think, ok.
Women’s snowboarding slopestyle final: Anika Morgan waits for her scores, helmet and goggles down, Boba Fett style. The commentators like her big backside 270” – so do the judges, and it’s better than her first run but not enough to leapfrog Japan’s Murase in first.
Men’s curling: Oh! A nice 6-0 lead for GB over the USA after four ends. This is a must win game for the Brits to have a chance of going through. They also need Canada to beat Italy (unhelpfully 3-2 down) and possibly Norway to beat Switzerland (all square at 3-3).
That is all from me. Tanya is here to take you through for the rest of the afternoon.
Summary of the day
If you’re just joining us, here is what you have missed so far:
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Mikaela Shiffrin won slalom gold to end her eight-year Winter Games medal drought. Shiffrin claimed the third Olympic title of her career, and her first since giant slalom gold at the 2018 Pyeongchang Games, with a rapid combined time of 1min 39.10sec. Camille Rast of Switzerland took silver and Sweden’s Anna Swenn Larsson rounded out the podium to claim the first Olympic medal of her career.
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China’s Su Yiming celebrated his 22nd birthday by winning the men’s snowboard slopestyle final with an unbeatable first run that handed his country their first gold medal of Milano Cortina. Taiga Hasegawa of Japan took silver, while Jake Canter claimed bronze for the United States.
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It was a good day for China as Xu Mengtao retained her title in the women’s freestyle skiing aerials. Danielle Scott of Australia took the silver, while the bronze went to Xu’s compatriot Shao Qi.
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Johannes Høsflot Klæbo led Norway to victory in the men’s cross-country team sprint to win his fifth gold of the Milano Cortina Games and 10th career Olympic title while Jonna Sundling and Maja Dahlqvist led Sweden to the country’s fourth gold medal in cross-country skiing of these Olympics.
Ice hockey: Slovakia advance to the men’s semi-finals for the second consecutive Olympics. The 2022 bronze medallists will play for a medal after beating the Germans 6-2.
Curling: Bruce Mouat clears a read before Daniel Casper fails to deliver allowing GB to steal and lead 2-0. Great Britain are doing a good job of keeping the rowdy American fans at bay in the first two ends.
🥇Shiffrin wins alpine skiing gold in women’s slalom
Mikaela Shiffrin is the Olympic champion! She has banished the demons of Beijing 2022 and is back at the top again. She crouches down after crossing the finish line. Shock? Disbelief? Pride? And then a hug from her mother.
It has been 12 years since her first Olympic gold in slalom which makes it the longest gap between individual golds in the same event at the Winter Games. She has failed to medal in nine of her 11 Olympic races (all events) since that Sochi slalom win.
Switzerland’s Camille Rast takes silver and Anna Swenn-Larsson of Sweden takes bronze.
Alpine skiing: What is happening?! Lena Duerr of Germany straddles the first gate of the second run and that is the end of her run. Mikaela Shiffrin up next …
Alpine skiing: Cornelia Oehlund of Sweden goes for an all or nothing approach but her left pole snaps about halfway through at that really slows her down. She is crying in the arms of her coach now. That is disappointing.
Alpine skiing: Switzerland’s Camille Rast, the only woman not named Mikaela Shiffrin who has won a slalom race on the World Cup this season, is in the lead with a time of 1:40.60. Three racers to go.
🥇 China’s Xu defends freestyle skiing title in women’s aerials
She has done it again! Silver at Sochi 2014, gold in front of home crowd at Beijing 2022 and gold again! Xu Mengtao’s back-full-full-full jump had a difficulty of 4.293 and she managed a score of 112.90.
It was almost a China podium sweep but on the last jump, Australia’s Danielle Scott managed enough to nab silver. Shao Qi takes bronze and Kong Fanyu drops to fourth.
Curling: Great Britain’s men’s team have just begun a crunch match against the United States. GB have four wins and four losses and they need a win, plus Canada to beat Italy (and possibly Norway to beat Switzerland) to make the semi-finals. Can the silver medallists from Beijing 2022 get the job done?
Paying homage to 1956, when Cortina previously hosted the Winter Olympics, a trio of Getty Images photographers have been using vintage Graflex cameras at the 2026 Games. In a modern twist, they have been adapted to record images on smartphones, enabling live transmission of the content captured.
Freestyle skiing: The top six in the women’s aerials is set and the medal event will be underway in about five minutes.
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Danielle Scott (AUS) – 117.19
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Kong Fanyu (CHN) – 113.33
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Kaila Kuhn (USA) – 109.90
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Xu Mengtao (CHN) – 107.75
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Winter Vinecki (USA) – 107.75
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Shao Qi (CHN) – 105.93
Scott and Kong passed on their second jumps, along with Xu and Shao, who all sit in the top six before the second jump in the first final.
Kaila Kuhn of the US, the reigning world champion, makes the most of her second chance, however, joining the stomped back full-full-full club with a score of 109.90 points.
Her teammate Winter Vinecki upgrades to a back full-full-full, improving on her score from the first jump with a score of 107.75 points.
Marion Thenault of Canada fails to crack the top six, finishing seventh after a less tidy back full-full-full attempt that nets 103.89 points. She is disappointed but will be back for the team event.
Alpine skiing: Slovakia’s reigning women’s slalom Olympic champion, Petra Vlhová, is the first of our 30 favourites to ski in the second run and has a smile at the bottom of her run as her time on skiis comes to an end with a time of 1:42.70.
Alpine skiing: The second run in the women’s slalom is underway. The top 30 skiers will have a go down after this morning’s first run skiing first in reverse order.
The favourite Mikaela Shiffrin, winner of eight of the last nine World Cup slaloms including seven of eight this season, has a 0.82sec lead on Lena Dürr of Germany.
Cross-country skiing: If you’re just joining us, Johannes Høsflot Klæbo has won another gold medal after leading Norway to victory in the men’s cross-country team sprint. He is up to double digits now which is frankly ridiculous.
Read the full report below.
Ice hockey: Slovakia are 3-0 up against Germany in the first quarter-final of the men’s tournament. The Germans had the perfect chance to grab one back after the Slovakia goalkeeper Samuel Hlavaj is penalised for tripping after throwing his stick … that’s one way to stop an attack, not legal though.
Pavol Regenda serves the penalty but Germany fail to muster much in the power play.
Freestyle skiing: Xu does not stay in that top spot for long. Her compatriot Kong Fanyu is next right after her and takes the lead with 113.33 (out of a maximum of 128). Her height was a bit better than Xu and she managed the harder tricks in the air.
Freestyle skiing: The reigning Olympic champion, Xu Mengtao of China, is up. She launches and does the highest spec of jumps and twists in this competition and she just about sticks the landing. Her fists go straight up into the air in triumph. She slots into the top spot with a score of 107.75.
Freestyle skiing: In this first final, 12 skiers will compete and the top six advance to the second final. In this event, skiers launch themselves off a ramp and into the air, performing aerial tricks before landing on a 34° to 39° slope about 30m long. Winter Vinecki of the US is in the lead with a score of 99.89.
