Italy claimed mixed doubles curling gold. (Photo: World Curling/Twitter)
Day four of Beijing 2022 was full of medal action across a number of different sports.
10 golds were up for offer across a long and enthralling day, with nations both dominating the podium and winning first time event medals.
Freestyle Skiing: Women’s Big Air
Making it’s debut for the first time at a Winter Olympics for skiers, the women’s Freestyle Big Air final was blown wide open by China’s Eileen Gu.
The teenager won her first gold medal in stunning fashion, rocketing to the top of the podium on her last jump.
Sitting in the silver medal position and needing to go big to move herself above Frenchwoman Tess Ledeux, she did just that.
With a perfectly executed double cork 1620, she smashed every other skier’s scores for the day and earned herself a huge 94.50.
It was golden heartbreak for Ledeux, after also finishing second in her final qualifying run. The silver was still her first Olympic medal, after coming 15th in slopestyle at PyeongChang.
Gold: Eileen Gu [CHN]
Silver: Tess Ledeux [FRA]
Bronze: Mathilde Gremaud [SUI]
Alpine Skiing: Men’s Super-G
The men’s Super-G got underway in the afternoon, the second skiing medals on offer after yesterday’s men downhill and women’s giant slalom.
47 men took to the 2267 metre long slopes at the Yanqing National Alpine Skiing Centre.
The Super-G combines elements of both downhill skiing and slalom, where athletes have to pass through gates while making it down the course as fast as possible, with a large focus on controlled turns.
Most importantly, skiers only get one run down the course. If they miss one gate, their Olympic dream is over.
For 13 athletes, this was the case. Many lost control just a few gates in, taking sudden declines too fast and flying through the air.
After claiming bronze in the downhill, Matthias Mayer was the best on the mountain, earning gold with a 1:19.94, only four hundredths of a second ahead of silver.
It was the 31-year-old veteran’s third Olympic gold, having also won three golds in the Super-G at World Cups.
Gold: Matthias Mayer [AUT]
Silver: Ryan Cochran-Siegle [USA]
Bronze: Aleksander Aamodt Kilde [NOR]
Curling: Mixed Doubles
Sweden and Great Britain faced off first in the bronze medal match, looking to bring home its consolation prize.
The Brits came in with the better form of the two, going down to the USA 6-5 in the semi-final. Sweden was smashed by Italy yesterday, losing 8-1 in a shock upset, given Italy didn’t even send a mixed doubles team to PyeongChang.
Great Britain took a point out of the first end, but Sweden fought back to take four in the second.
With a stone perfectly placed in the tee and protection along the centre line, the Swedes had no issues batting away every British challenge and leaving them without a single stone in scoring position.
Great Britain’s second last stone of the third end knocked one of both theirs and Sweden’s out of the crowded circle, setting up for a big ending.
But the Swedes exerted their dominance, going up 7-1 to end the third.
The Brits made life difficult for their opponents in the fourth end, lining up three of their stones along the centre line. But on the second last stone, the Swedes found their way back into the tee.
Sweden made it 8-1 to end the fourth, with Almida de Val and Oskar Eriksson charging further and further ahead.
Great Britain’s final stone of the fifth was another of purely hope, knocking away half of the stones in the circle, and once again giving up another point.
After six ends, Sweden earned bronze in the curling mixed doubles.
And while Sweden may have blown Great Britain out of the water, the gold medal match between Italy and Norway delivered.
It got off to a tense start, with both nations trading points in the first two ends. Italy asserted its dominance across the next four, taking four points away from them.
But the Norwegians weren’t done yet, taking three points across the next three ends to come into the final end just two points down.
It wasn’t to be, and in a shock win, Italy took home gold.
Gold: Italy
Silver: Norway
Bronze: Sweden
Snowboarding: Parallel Giant Slalom
Both the women’s and men’s parallel giant slalom events awarded their medals today. It’s an events that pits snowboarders head to head going down the mountain and past flags.
The women’s event was up first, with both the small and big finals.
Gloria Kotnik [SLO] and Michelle Dekker [NED] were the pair going for bronze, with Kotnik getting over the line first.
For the big final, Ester Ledecka earned gold for the Czech Republic.
Gold: Ester Ledecka [CZE]
Silver: Daniela Ulbing [AUT]
Bronze: Glora Kotnik [SLO]
Embed from Getty ImagesAustria and Slovenia managed to both medal twice in the parallel twice, making the podium on the men’s side as well.
Victor Wild [ROC] claimed the small final, with Italian opponent Roland Fischnaller failing to finish. But the race for gold was a tense one.
Benjamin Karl crossed the line just .82 of a second faster than his opponent to win his first ever Olympic gold at 36-years-old.
Gold: Benjamin Karl [AUT]
Silver: Tim Mastank [SLO]
Bronze: Victor Wild [ROC]
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Biathlon: Men’s 20km individual
One of the biggest tests of endurance the Olympics has to offer, the men’s 20km individual was incredibly tight up top.
Frenchman Quentin Fillon Maillet took home gold after also winning silver in the mixed relay, making it two for his campaign.
He finished with a time of 48:47.4, but was only seconds ahead of silver. His shooting was particularly strong, getting through shots quickly and efficiently.
Silver went to Anton Smolski [BLR], only 14.8 seconds behind.
Gold: Quentin Fillon Maillet [FRA]
Silver: Anton Smolski [BLR]
Bronze: Johannes Thingnes Boe [NOR]
Speed Skating: Men’s 1500m
The fourth of many speed skating medals to come, the men’s 1500m was a strong showing for the Netherlands, claiming both silver and gold.
29 skaters were only separated by just over six seconds, showing the quality of the field on show on the ice.
Only 1.03 separated gold and bronze, with Dutchman Kjeld Nuis set an Olympic record with a blistering 1:43.21, beating out countryman Thomas Krol.
Krol said the record just minutes before him, but it didn’t last long.
It was a third Olympic medal for Nuis, having also previously held the world record in the 1000m.
Gold: Kjeld Nuis [NED]
Silver: Thomas Krol [NED]
Bronze: Minseok Kim [KOR]
Cross-Country Skiing: Free Sprint
After a long day of qualifying, both the men’s and women’s free sprint medals were handed out.
It was a first time winner on the women’s side, with Sweden’s Jonna Sundling winning her first Olympic gold at her first Olympics.
Having claimed gold at both the individual and team sprint at the 2021 World Cup, she took that form into the biggest stage and won accordingly.
She finished 2.88 seconds ahead of countrywoman Maja Dahlqvist in what was a strong event for the Swedes.
Gold: Jonna Sundling [SWE]
Silver: Maja Dahlqvist [SWE]
Bronze: Jesse Diggins [USA]
Now well and truly the most successful male sprinter, Norway’s Johannes Høsflot Klæbo won his fourth Olympic gold at just 25.
He was coming into the event looking to defend his gold from PyeongChang, and did just that.
It was only a quarter of a second that separated him and Italian Federico Pellegrino. It was heartbreak for Pellegrino, who also finished with a silver behind Klæbo in 2018.
Gold: Johannes Høsflot Klæbo [NOR]
Silver: Federico Pellegrino [NOR]
Bronze: Alexander Terentev [ROC]
Luge: Women’s Singles
After a strong training run showing, the final run nearly ended in carnage for a number of athletes, who all became disloged on the final turn.
Makena Hodgson (CAN) was the first to complete the fourth and final run without incident, finishing 17th overall.
Austria would have been kicking itself, with three athletes finishing across fourth to sixth by less than a second away from bronze.
But in the end it was Germany’s day, claiming both gold and silver.
Gold: Natalie Geisenberger [GER]
Silver: Anna Berreiter [GER]
Bronze: Tatyana Ivanova [ROC]
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