Key events
Snowboard: On to the mixed team cross final. Four teams, three medals. And with the way Great Britain have been racing, surely, surely they come away with something here.
🥇 Brignone wins second gold of Games in women’s giant slalom
What a fairytale story for the Italian as she comes home in first place with a time of 2:13.50.
From coming back from a serious injury right before the Games. It is a dram and the Italian crowd know it – they are going wild!
Snowboard: Bankes tucked up into second but here she comes, almost throwing off Castor of France and she speeds into first in the final straight. Wow! GB into the finals with a win in the semis. Great team effort!
Snowboard: Huw Nightingale has a great start and that is the best first section from him today. He settles into second behind France and finished 0.03sec behind. Switzerland get sagged and so Bankes will only be racing against two, realistically. Back at the top, Bankes is getting a new board set up.
Snowboard: Semi-finals here we go! GB’s Huw Nightingale and Charlotte Bankes are in the first one here alongside France, Switzerland and Australia.
Alpine skiing: Mikaela Shiffrin is next. Let’s see if she can improve on her 7th placed finish … she skis down well but her speed is conservative and she is 0.25sec behind the current leader, Lara Della Mea of Italy after a few really late turns. Sixth for now and off the podium. She waves to the supporters who will be rooting for her in the slalom in two days’ time.
Alpine skiing: Asja Zenere of Italy leads the second run after 12 racers in the women’s giant slalom second run.
Snowboard: Huw Nightingale loses ground in his race and finishes third, 1.09sec behind Canada’s Eliot Grondin. That gives Charlotte Bankes a lot of work to do.
But not a problem for her! She moves to the lead from the inside and then is stuck in second but at the final stretch she edges ahead of Australia’s Mia Clift. Bankes and Nightingale are through to the semi-finals. “British finally have something to cheer about in the snowboard cross,” says Ed Leigh on BBC Sport commentary.
Snowboard: The mixed team cross event has begun with Charlotte Bankes and Huw Nightingale of Team GB in action. France 2 and Switzerland 1 take the first two spots to qualify for the semis.
GB up next!
Alpine skiing: On to the women’s giant slalom. Italy’s Federica Brignone is ahead by 0.34sec after the first of two runs. The 35-year-old already won gold in the super-G earlier at these Games and is competing after recovering from multiple leg fractures and a torn anterior cruciate ligament which she suffered last April.
Lena Duerr of Germany is second, 0.34sec behind and Brignone’s teammate Sofia Goggia is third.
Mikaela Shiffrin of the US, looking for her first Olympic medal in eight years, sits seventh, just over a second back. Shiffrin, the 2018 Olympic champion in this event, is trying to bounce back after a disappointing fourth place finish in the combined earlier in the Games, when her sluggish slalom run dropped Shiffrin and teammate and reigning Olympic downhill champion Breezy Johnson from first to fourth.
Shiffrin promised she would learn from her slalom run in the combined. While she was solid and never came close to danger, she also could not quite find the speed of the leaders. None of her four timing splits ranked in the top four among early competitors.
Summary of the day so far
If you’re just joining us, here is what has happened on day 9 so far:
Johannes Høsflot Klæbo led Norway to victory in the men’s 4×7.5km cross-country relay to win a record ninth career Olympic gold. The 29-year-old has won four gold medals at these Games and is widely expected to take another two in the men’s team sprint and 50km classic race on Saturday.
After a miserable start to the Olympics for the much-heralded Swedish biathlon team, Martin Ponsiluoma managed to shake off the dust with a perfect series of five shots on the final shoot and superb last lap to grab gold in the men’s 12.5km pursuit. The 30-year-old piled the pressure on the leader Emilien Jacquelin of France, who missed twice to incur two costly penalty loops and open the way to victory for the Swede.
Canada’s Mikael Kingsbury won gold in the new Winter Olympics sport of dual moguls, claiming victory three days after narrowly missing a win in the single-format moguls. The 33-year-old Kingsbury, the oldest man racing in dual moguls, has claimed a medal in each of the four Olympics he has competed in. It was Canada’s first title of Milano Cortina.
Bruce Mouat’s British men’s team picked up a 9-4 curling round-robin win over Germany, while Olympic champions Sweden suffered their fourth loss of the campaign to leave their title defence on the brink, losing to the United States 8-5.
Bobsleigh: The first two heats have finished in the women’s monobob. Germany’s Laura Nolte has a 0.22sec lead over Elana Meyers Taylor of the United States, with a combined time of 1:59.12. She has delivered the two cleanest runs by far, mastering this tricky track better than most.
The Beijing 2022 champion Kaillie Humphries Armbruster of Canada moved into a third in the second heat, followed by Switzerland’s Melanie Hasler and Kaysha Love of the US. Heats three and four are tomorrow.
🥇 Norway win cross-country skiing in the men’s 4 x 7.5km relay as Klæbo breaks gold medal record
Norway’s Johannes Høsflot Klæbo crosses the finish line well in first and he is surrounded by his teammates. He is the first Winter Olympian in history to win nine golds. And he still has a couple more events to go at this Olympics.
Klæbo surpasses the record that his compatriots Marit Bjørgen, Ole Einar Bjørndalen, Bjørn Daehlie, who all had eight golds before Milano Cortina.
Victor Lovera helps France win their first medal in this event to take silver and Italy’s Federico Pellegrino pips Finland to bronze.
Thanks Daniel and hello all. Klæbo’s extended his lead to about 21sec now. He is almost there …
Righto, I’m off for a break, but Yara El-Shaboury is here to call Klæbo home. What a ludicrous freak of nature he is; amazing behaviour.
Gosh, Lovera is indeed paying for the effort which halved the lead and, with a circuit to go, Klæbo is 19.5s ahead, his ninth gold medal so close he can almost feel it breaking. History has its eyes on him.
Klæbo continues, daintily skipping around a corner before focusing on forcing his way uphill; meantime, Rob Walker notes he’s two more events to come, so who even knows what sort of record he’s setting as he continues in pursuit of a ninth gold.
Heat two of the women’s monobob is over, Nolte of Germany leading overall. But with Meyers Taylor and Armbruster Humphries of USA just 0.22 and 0.31 behind, in second and third, tomorrow is on.
France cut the lead to almost 6s, but how much puff has Lovera exhausted putting requisite effort in? Klæbo has a look over his shoulder, then powers on uphill; he’s in a race here.
Tagged in, Klæbo gets himself away with a 12.2s lead over France; Finland are third. But this is all about the ridiculous Norwegian. History is his for the skiing yourself half-dead then taking.
Norway lead the men’s 4×7.5km relay by around 20 seconds. Klaebo’s ninth gold is so close, and what a party he’ll be having tonight if he can see it out.
Armbruster Humphries is 40; goodness, to still be doing this.
Oooh, Hasler of Switzerland is going well and she takes the lead in the monobob, but now Armbruster Humphries of USA, the reigning champ – fourth on the first run – is away. Can she move up the leaderboard? It looks that way as she nails the course … and she’s 0.47 inside the leading time, going into the gold-medal position.
I’m also watching the second run of the women’s monobob, which isn’t a haircut; the third and fourth, which will decide the medals, are tomorrow but, in the meantime, Buckwitz of Germany leads.
In this relay, the first two team members use classic technique and the second two freestyle.
Norway still lead, which means Klaebo is in with a chance of his ninth gold medal. I think he’s on the anchor leg, but for now his teammate Hedegart is ploughing on.
Norway are well ahead now in the men’s 4×7.5km relay, coming into the stadium, and the leas is 10.2s; Finland are second, Italy third and France fourth.
The relay course has hills they kind of skip up, followed by some downhill on the other side; Norway lead from Finland, the gap widening, with Canada and USA third and fourth and we come towards the end of leg two, two more to go.
My goodness, this men’s 4.75km relay looks deeply unpleasant. Norway lead, from Finland, from USA, from Canada, but it’s close, 1.8s separating the first four.
Don’t forget: coming up at 12.30pm, we’ve got the second and final run of the women’s giant slalom, Brignone of Italy, super g gold medalist, with a decent lead having come back from shattering her leg at the end of last season.
Also going on:
Txema’s run is competent enough but nothing wowing, then out of nowhere, looking to turn it up on his second run, he catches a toe-edge, and that’s the end of his competition. On the plus side, though, he’s fine, and he’ll be back.
Kira Kamura, Japan’s big air gold medalist, covers himself in mediocrity with a 69.20 mark; that leaves him 12th with, I think, only 12 going into the final. Menzies of Australia, Kleveland of Norway and McMorris of Canada are through, having gone above 81; now here comes Txema…
Txema is a tremendous name. Mazet-Brown was born on Réunion, near Madagascar, to a French father and a British mother, growing up in New Zealand and, at 19, has plenty of time to get as good as he’ll need to.
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The men’s 4×7.5km relay is under way in the cross-country skiing, Klaebo going for a record ninth golsd, while Txema Mazxet-Brown is repping for GB in the men’s slopestyle snowboard quallies.
🥇 Mikael Kingsbury of Canada wins gold in men’s freestyle skiing dual moguls
He is the event’s first champion having won moguls gold last time out; Horshima takes silver for Japan, with Graham having secured bronze for Australia.
Horshima can’t do anything with the second jump! Golds is going to Kingsbury!
Off they go and both nail the first jump but Horshima is losing control!
Now for the final, Horshima of Japan versus Kingsbury of Canada, the favourite…
The judges take a while to reach a verdict in the men’s moguls bronze-medal run-off … but Graham of Australia beats Shimikawa of Japan 20-15.
🥇 Martin Ponsiluoma wins gold for Sweden in men’s biathlon 12.5km pursuit
Lægreid of Norway takes silver and Jacquelin of France hangs on for bronze.
Here we go with the mogul small final, Shimikawa v Graham, for the bronze, and Shimikawa leads but Graham comes from behind to finish first; who will take bronze?
The final of the dual moguls is imminent; in the biathlon, Ponsiluoma leads Laegrid by 20.6.
Beef on ice.
More more more more more more more.
Time for the second semi of the men’s dual moguls, Graham of Australia against Horshima of Japan, and they both give the run a lesson, Horshima coming from behind to finish first … and snatch a 21-14 win. He meets Kingsbury in the final.
Laegrid of Norway is past Jacquelin now, with Perrot, also of France, chasing him; Ponsiluoma leads by 19s.
Ponsiluoma is still killing it in the biathlon, but Jacquelin is being chased and he’s struggling.
It’s time for the semis of the men’s dual moguls. The intensity of this tournament is brilliant and our first ruckus puts Kingsbury against Shimakawa, and the Japanese loses the run of himself! Kingsbury of Canada eases into the final and will take some beating.
