Corey Peters, the defending champion in the Para alpine downhill sitting event, finished in 5th place at the Milano Cortina games overnight.
The Kiwi, who skied second, narrowly avoided a tumble early in his run, with the time spent recovering affecting his eventual time of 1:20:89.
That fifth-placed effort was more than four seconds slower than his gold medal winning exploits four years ago in Beijing.
Peters told 1News he was disappointed with himself.
“That performance, I’m not super proud of it, I know I’ve got more in me,” he said.
“I was definitely swearing to myself inside because you know you’ve kind of made the mistakes, and it was kind of just trying to get the ski going again but by then, you’ve already lost momentum.'”
The downhill event was marred by crashes in soft and slushy conditions, with only 11 out of 23 competitors successfully completing the course.
Peters said it was a frustrating situation to be in, but acknowledged everyone faced the same obstacles.
“You work four years, you work pretty hard and then to turn up and get conditions like this where it’s far from ideal, does make it a bit challenging,” the sit-skier said.
Head coach Daniel Bogue said it was “incredible” Peters was able to complete the event during “brutal” snow conditions after his errors out of jumps.
“We weren’t here to come second, we were here to win it and worked to that plan but like just one mistake down through those gates and it’s amazing he stayed on the ski really.”
He said when the snow was soft, the ski sinks into it and slides, affecting balance.
“Then it loads the shock up and then any bump after that the shock just expands and then you get popped up in the air and it’s just so hard for the athletes when they can’t feel what’s going on beneath them just to stay upright, I mean the rigs are pretty tweaky as they are and when the snow is soft, it just makes it so hard,” Bogue said.
Peters said he will learn from the snow conditions today for his upcoming Super G Sitting and Giant Slalom Sitting events.
“The Paralympic Games in March with the whole global warming to it, we’re getting warm temperatures all the time and it’s just something we’re going to have to deal with,” he said.
Asked if he will give feedback to organisers about the timing of the Games, Peters referred to alpine skier Alice Robinson experiencing soft snow three weeks ago at the Olympic Winter Games.
“No doubt it’s going to be even worse for us.”
He said the course was the most challenging conditions of the four Paralympics he’s experienced.
“2018 PyeongChang was close with the softer conditions, but this is probably one step further. Beijing’s probably been the best in terms of snow conditions. Sochi was pretty bad as well, they were throwing a lot of salt on it. The snow was pretty much rotten in Sochi so this is something we’ve dealt with over the last three out the four games.”
Peters’ friend Chris Rowlands travelled to Cortina from London to watch him compete.
Peters grew up with Rowlands’ older brother in Taranaki, surfing together and hanging out.
“I just grew up looking up to them and just lucky enough to know him,” Rowlands said.
“If I know Corey, he’ll just take this as fuel to the fire, he’ll be keen as to get into his next events and use it to come out stronger. He’s a legend.”
Norway’s Jasper Pedersen claimed the gold in a time of 1:18:14.
Dutch skier Niels de Langen was second with 1:19:24 while Canada’s Kurt Oatway picked up the bronze.
Peters has two more events at these Winter Paralympics, the Men’s Super-G and then the Giant Slalom alongside fellow New Zealander Adam Hall.
Watch live and free Milano Cortina 2026 Paralympic Winter Games, streaming on five TVNZ+ channels and DUKE from Saturday March 7 to Monday March 16.