🥇Johannes Hoesflot Klaebo wins his third gold of the Games – in the men’s 10km cross-country skiing
Klaebo is now the joint most decorated Winter Olympian in history! And there are three more chances of gold to come, in the men’s relay, men’s team sprint and 50k marathon.
France’s Mathis wins silver, and Einar Hedegart bronze. Britain’s Andrew Musgrave finishes a fantastic sixth, bare arms and all.
Key events
Speed skating: at 5000m, neither Ghiotto or Bersma are ahead of the clock. Arms clasped behind their backs they bend and stride, left, right, left, right. Nine laps to go.
Speed skating: The first of the final three pairs are off: world champion Davide Ghiotto and former Olympic champion, 40-year old Jorrit Bergsma.
Fun fact – the skaters soak their suits in cold water before they start to keep themselves cool.
Ice hockey: It’s knockout time in the women’s ice hockey, with Czechia and Sweden currently goal less in the first half.
While in group A of the men’s competition, Czechia are 2-0 up against France, and are dominating shots on goal.
Speed skating: there’s a gold medal waiting for the fastest man to cover 10,000m of ice. It takes over 12 minutes to complete so a balm to those overstimulated by the scream of the sliding events.
Five athletes have already skated, seven to go, with Poland’s Vladimir Semirunniy currently in gold medal position. Three pairings are yet to lace their boots, including Italian Davide Ghiotto and 19 year old phenomenon Metodej Jilek. They’re polishing the ice over in the Milano rink, and will restart in 20 minutes.
Skeleton: name of the games, Mystique Ro, has just navigated the skeleton track, but doesn’t dominate as her name suggests and currently lies in 15th. With most of the top names done, the top three is still: Janine Flock, followed by Susanne Kreher, with GB’s Tabby Stoecker in third.
Oooof, Sujung Hong has a horrible run down, sliding into the walls, knocking all parts of her body, braking with her toes, skeleton squealing, fingernail down blackboard. It’s a relief to see her in one piece at the bottom.
Curling: GB duly lost to South Korea, 9-3, making it two losses from two for the British women, with an intimidating role-call of opponents to come.
The other three round-robin games are still going: Canada lead the USA 8-7, Switzerland are on top against China 7-3, and it’s a Scandi-thriller, with Denmark and Sweden currently drawing 5-5.
A cracking tale – Rich Ruohonen, the USA’s oldest Winter Olympian.
GB’s Charlotte Bankes rues mistakes in the snowboard cross
Rotten luck for Bankes – back to the drawing board.
Women’s skeleton: full of admiration for these women’s neck muscles and core as their tea-trays scream across the ice. With seven athletes down the shute, GB’s Tabby Stoecker is still in second place.
Women’s Skeleton: Austria’s Janine Flock flies down the track at 77mph to place an excellent marker down for the rest to follow.
Britain’s best hope Tabby Stoecker follows soon after, in a bright white helmet and all in one blue suit. She sprints off and is ahead of the clock half way down the track but a brush with the wall slows her down and she finishes second.
Britain’s Amelia Coltman will go ninth and Freya Tarbit 11th in this first run.
Curling: things are looking dismal for the GB quartet, now 7-3 down to South Korea after seven ends. Lots of worried looking faces.
Prior to these Games, there were a number of reports on the future of the Winter Olympics and Paralympics in a world of climate instability. ,
Torched looked the scale of the threat facing winter sports and the incogruity of Milan-Cortina being sponsored by fossil fuel giant Eni.
There is also a great read by Mattias Goldmann, CEO of the Swedish 2030 Secretariat, for Forbes, which concludes: “In the last five years alone, Italy lost 265 ski resorts, and France which is hosting the next Winter Olymipcs, has lost over 180.”
Before the games began, president Kirsty Coventry said the IOC must “be better” on climate change after being delivered a petition signed by over 21,000 people calling for the end to fossil fuel companies sponsoring winter sports.
🥇Quentin Fillon Maillet pips Norwegians to men’s biathlon gold
A second gold of the week for the delighted Maillet, who pushes Norway’s Vetle Sjaastad Christiansen and Sturla Holm Lægreid into silver and bronze in sharp-shooting on skis.
Britain’s Jacques Jefferies was 81st.
10m skiing: More kudos to Britain’s Andrew Musgrave, who not only pocketed Britain’s best position in an Olympic cross-country skiing competition earlier today (6th), but was so wrung out that he threw up half way through his post match interview.
Curling: Back at the Cortina curling stadium, Britain’s women have just taken a point at the fifth end and are now tying 3-3 with South Korea. Earlier today, a BBC expert said that if the women come back home with more wins than losses, that would be a good result.
Some cross-pollination from Our Man in Cortina, Andy Bull. He has found out from a colleague at Gazetta that they have a reporter on the ground in India for the men’s T20 World Cup and were very chuffed about the win over Nepal.
Thanks Yara. A surprising win there for Josie Baff in the snowboarding, but it is the kind of high-voltage craziness where unexpected things happen.
That is all from me today. Tanya is back to take you through the rest of the afternoon.
Ice hockey: The buzzer ends Sweden’s misery against Finland but not before Mikko Ratanen scores an empty-net goal at the end of the third. Final score: Finland 4-1 Sweden.
Sean Ingle
Free condoms for competitors at the Winter Olympics have run out within a record-breaking three days, according to La Stampa.
“The supplies ran out in just three days,” an anonymous athlete told the Italian newspaper. “They promised us more will arrive, but who knows when.”
It blamed the Olympic organisers, saying they had not been “particularly generous with the numbers”. “In Paris the athletes received 300,000 condoms — two per day each— but the numbers for these Winter Games were significantly lower: not even 10,000,” La Stampa’s report states.
Just under 3,000 athletes are competing at the Winter Olympics, compared to around 10,500 in the Paris Games two years ago.
Read the full story below.
🥇Australia’s Josie Baff wins snowboard gold in the women’s cross final
The two youngsters want to tear up the script as Noemie Wiedmer and Josie Baff speed out but Eva Adamczykova is patient in third and waits just behind Baff … Michela Moioli is in fourth, can she come from behind again.
Adamczykova picks up speed into second as Wiedmer makes an error and finds herself in the back. Baff stays calm though and crosses that line before screaming out in joy. Adamczykova takes silver and Moioli bronze.
Baff, the 17th seed, is an Olympic champion!
Biathlon: Tomas Mikyska of the Czech Republic sets the early standard at 25:05.3 (one miss), but has been passed by Finaland’s Olli Hiidensalo, who takes the lead at 24:02.4 (zero misses).
Snowboard: A downcast Charlotte Bankes speaks to BBC Sport after her quarter-final exit:
I feel like I’ve done exactly the same as four years ago. We have worked incredibly hard to improve that but I haven’t made any difference today. I have been struggling with the track all the week but we thought we found solutions. I really wanted this one. Too many mistakes.
In the pack behind I didn’t manage to make the right choices. Everyone is racing incredibly well and I just didn’t manage it.
I am normally good at making the overtakes and I kind of made a good start until I made a mistake and that killed my speed. Didn’t manage to find the space.
Sorry, was hoping to put on a better show. It can be cruel. We have worked incredibly hard over the last four years to get a good result. Unfortunately, the team did all the work behind me and I didn’t manage to pull it off. We will regroup for Sunday [team event] and hopefully put on a better show.
Snowboard: Unreal! Michela Moioli of Italy is through to the final after coming behind from fourth place. A mistake on the opening strait does not help but she never gives up and speeds by at the end to finish the second semi-final in front.
Joining her in the last round is Noemie Wiedmer of Switzerland, Josie Baff of Australia and Eva Adamczykova of Czech Republic.
The IOC would be open to reviewing guidelines governing the rights of athletes to freely express themselves at the Winter Games but the rules have been embraced by competitors, the IOC president, Kirsty Coventry, said today.
The case of Ukrainian skeleton racer Vladyslav Heraskevych, who was disqualified yesterday over a helmet depicting athletes killed since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, has brought Games rules on freedom of expression back into focus. He has since appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport.
Coventry, who was elected to the top IOC post last year, had led a review of the guidelines governing expression in the Games as head of the athletes’ commission back in 2021.
“[Any new review of guidelines] would fall within the working group looking at all fundamental principles of Olympism,” Coventry told a press conference. “I have had a number of conversations with athletes over the last couple of days. They still feel strongly that we should be able to keep part of our Olympic movement, and their Olympic experience, safe.“
Under current rules, athletes can raise issues of interest or concern to them at any of the Games press conferences, mixed zones, team meetings, interviews or on social media. But they cannot do it on the field of play or the medal ceremonies, with the IOC saying it wants to keep the fields of play free from any distraction.
“If our athletes would like us to look at [the rules], we are open to everything,” Coventry said. “But the rules are the rules as of today, and I believe they are good rules. “They keep our athletes safe from being used. The athletes believe the guidelines are relevant in today’s world.”
Snowboard: Huge cheers as Italy’s Michaela Moioli advances alongside Switzerland’s Noemie Wiedmer. And in the final quarter-final France’s Lea Casta and Pia Zerkhold are through. Semi-finals are next.
Snowboard: France’s Julia Nirani-Pereira and Faye Thelen of the US advance, knocking out the Beijing 2022 silver medallist, France’s Chloe Trespeuch. This is a brutal sport and all about the fine margins.
GB drought goes on as Bankes goes out of snowboard cross
Snowboard: Bankes does not start well and she is in fourth … all to do here. She tries to get ahead but then over jumps a hill. Right on the end at the finish line she gets clipped by Siegenthaler.. Eva Adamczykova and Josie Baff qualify for the semis. Bankes is so disappointed, her face says it all as the four snowboarders line up to see their final position. The hunt for the GB medal continues.
Snowboard: Charlotte Bankes is in the first quarter-final against Australia’s Josie Baff, Sina Siegenthaler of Switzerland and Czech Republic’s Eva Adamczykova. Here we go!
Snowboard: Austria’s Pia Zerkhold, Germany’s Jana Fischer, France’s Lea Casta and Italy’s Sofia Groblechner are the final four to advance to the quarter-finals, coming up right now.
Biathlon: This sport has brought quite a bit of drama at these Games, and we are back for more in the men’s 10km sprint.
Biathletes will fire 10 shots, and each miss is punished with one trip around the much-dreaded penalty loop.
The home favourite Tommaso Giacomel and 20km individual Olympic champion Johan-Olav Botn are medal contenders but they have 87 other athletes to get through.
Snowboard: Oof, Anouk Doerig of Switzerland takes a stumble in this heat. Think she is OK though. Michela Moioli of Italy, the gold medalist in Pyeongchang 2018 is through alongside Australia’s Mia Clift.
Snowboard: France’s Julia Nirani-Pereira keeps her lead from the start to advance from heat four alongside the United States’s Stacy Gaskill.
Ice hockey: Joel Armia of the LA Kings has given Finland a 3-1 lead against a struggling Sweden. Slovakia now lead Italy 2-1.
Snowboard: Chloe Trespeuch of France wins the third heat, very impressive race given her start was quite slow. Faya Thelen of the US joins her in the quarter-finals.
Snowboard: Great start from all four snowboarders after a bit of a wait. Charlotte Bankes and Abbey Wilson are toe to toe before the former makes the move and takes the lead. She closes the door early on Sina Siegenthaler right at the end and finishes first in her heat! A good race for the Team GB hopeful before the quarter-finals.
