Queenstown skier Alice Robinson missed out on the medals in the Giant Slalom at the Winter Olympics.
Robinson finished eighth in a very tight Giant Slalom competition, missing out on the podium by just 0.13 seconds.
Italy’s Federica Brignone completed a golden double on home snow adding the giant slalom title to the Super-G won last week, while U.S. Alpine ski great Mikaela Shiffrin again missed out on a medal finishing 11th.
Robinson made a couple of minor mistakes on her first run and was sitting in 10th position. She managed to improve a couple of places on her second run.
“I was pretty disappointed,” Robinson said, describing the moment when she first crossed the line to see that she’d missed out on a medal spot.
“I came down, and I saw I was in fourth (and that point) and only 12 hundredths behind. It was hard, but then watching the rest of the race play out, it actually ended up a bit better than I thought.”
Robinson finished eighth equal in the Super G last week.
“There have been so many emotions for me in the past month. I really wasn’t sure what to expect today. I think GS has been a bit of a question mark for me the past two months. From having such a good start to the season and then I was really struggling a lot, especially in the last race,” Robinson said.
“So, today I really didn’t know what was going to happen. I felt a lot better on my skis but I didn’t really feel like I was going to be in the running for a medal. Then to have it be so close and let it slip away, it was quite sad but I’m proud at the same time.”
Snowboarders top qualifying
Dane Menzies and Zoi Sadowski-Synnot have topped their respective snowboarding slopestyle qualification.
With bad weather forecast the competition was brought forward a day with Menzies putting in a strong first run which included a switch backside 1260 into frontside 1440, finishing with a 1660.
His score of 86.06 put him in the top spot, and there he stayed.
“It felt pretty good for sure, I definitely was not expecting that,” said Menzies. “I didn’t expect the judges to score that high, but they’re liking my selection of rails, so that’s good.”
In the women’s qualifying rounds, defending Olympic champion Zoi Sadowski-Synnott made an immediate statement, posting an opening score of 81.73 to move into second place.
She went big on run two, adding a 1260 to her jump line and lifting her score to 88.08 to take over first place.
“It feels really good to land,” said Sadowski-Synnott. “There was a lot of pressure going into today, but I’m just grateful that we got good weather so that all the girls could show their best snowboarding.”
Lyon Farrell and Rocco Jamieson finished 15th and 18th respectively in the men’s slopestyle qualifying, while Lucia Georgalli was 20th in the women’s.
The women’s slopestyle final is scheduled for 1am Wednesday morning (NZT) with the men’s on Thursday at 12:30am (NZT).
Harrington into final
Wānaka freeskier Luca Harrington has qualified for the final of the big air this morning.
Harrington finished fifth after three rounds of qualifying, with the top 12 from the 29 entrants progressing through to Wednesday’s final.
The 2025 big air world champion was in 12th place after the first run with a score of 84.25 after completing a right double cork 1440 and back with a 1260 with safety grab.
The 21-year-old followed that up with a switch right triple cork 1800 with a two-handed grab in his second run to score 92.00 and move up to fifth overall.
He then finished with a right-side triple cork 1980 safety grab in his third run to score 87.75.
His combined two best runs scored 179.75 while American Mac Forehand finished top with 183.00.
“Felt really good, came in with a plan and executed the plan,” Harrington told Sky Sports afterwards.
“I’ve been really working hard on that first trick I put down and it didn’t get rewarded the way I wanted it to. It’s been one of the hardest tricks I’ve ever worked through so that was a bit of a shame to see.”
Harrington admitted his bronze in the slopestyle last week did affect him.
“It was hard to mentally get back into the swing of things and focus up to work my hardest in big air, but by the third night of training I was feeling really good again.
“No matter how this goes I’m just so honoured to be here and hopefully put down a good show in finals as well.”
Fellow New Zealanders Ben Barclay finished 19th and Lucas Ball 24th in qualifying.