Winter Olympics 2022: Latest results and news from Beijing
If Australia’s 4-0 humbling of England this summer in cricket wasn’t enough, Britain’s pants are being pulled down again if the results in Beijing are any indication.
Stop the fight and send out the search party because Britain’s Winter Olympic team has gone missing in Beijing.
After years of beating their chests whenever they’ve finished ahead of Australia on the Olympic medals table, the Poms have suddenly gone all quiet in China — and for good reason.
With a week still to go, the medal count between sport’s biggest rivals has become a whitewash with Australia sailing along on four and Britain yet to get off the mark.
If that 4-0 scoreline looks familiar, it’s because it is the same lopsided result from the most recent men’s Ashes cricket series.
As hard as it is to top that, the flogging the poms are getting from Australia at the Winter Olympics is perhaps even more embarrassing because they have poured an eye watering $42 million into preparing a team that has delivered nothing but duck eggs.
The ultimate humiliation for Old Blighty was seeing Australia’s Jackie Narracott win the silver medal in the women’s skeleton on Sunday.
An old fashioned battler, Narracott became an instant legend after becoming the first Aussie to win an Olympic medal in a sliding event, but the irony was not lost on the Brits because that’s their banker.
The Brits have won a medal every time it’s been held at the Winter Games, including golds at the last three Olympics, but came up empty handed this time.
And Narracott has the Brits to thank for her stunning success because she lives in England and is married to Dom Parsons, the only British man to win an Olympic medal in the terrifying head-first sport.
Parsons was the toast of Britain after he won bronze in South Korea four years ago but now his Aussie wife — who he also coaches — has just gone one up on him by winning silver.
“I definitely have bragging rights,” Narracott said.
“He’s already been told that by just about everybody.
“He’s not going to be able to forget it anytime soon.”
Parsons already knows he’s in for a ribbing from both Aussies and his fellow Brits after helping out the old enemy.
“She might use that against me in the future but I couldn’t be happier for her,” he said.
“She can have the bragging rights for this, it feels great.”
Britain has beaten Australia on the medals table at each of the last four Summer Games and the last two Winter Olympics but is facing a total wipeout in Beijing, with the realistic prospect of failing to win a single medal at an Olympics for the first time in 30 years.
Britain’s losses have been Australia’s gain with the green and golds enjoying their best ever Winter Olympics, with four medals already in the bag, prompting speculation the Brits should come begging for tips on how to win on snow and ice.
Resisting the temptation to poke fun Britain’s failed campaign, the Australian team chef de mission Geoff Lipshut laughed off the idea that Australia would ever help the Brits out, but did reveal he missed out on a bottle of wine because of Covid.
It’s been customary for the Australian and British team leaders to wager a bottle of plonk on which country finishes with the most medals but it didn’t happen this time.
“Because we’re not mixing with other people,” Lipshut explained.
“But they’ve had some remarkable performances, particularly in skeleton…so I’m sure they know what they’re doing.”
Extreme weather delays our aerial big-hitters
Qualifying for the women’s aerials — one of Australia’s best medal prospects at the Beijing Winter Olympics — has been postponed because of extreme weather in the Chinese mountains.
With high winds and heavy snow falling, the lack of visibility at the jumps venue at Genting Snow Park made it too dangerous to proceed.
Olympic organisers said the competition, which was initially due to be held over two days including finals, has been pushed back until Monday.
Beijing 2022 organisers were negotiating with broadcasters to hold the Olympic competition on Monday as a one day event, starting at 3pm, instead of conducting it over two days that had been originally scheduled.
If this is signed off, it means that Laura Peel, Danielle Scott and Gabi Ash will compete in up to two qualifying rounds in the afternoon which will whittle the field down to 12 finalists.
The finals will be then held as originally planned on Monday evening.
Aerials is one of Australia’s traditional strengths, having won Olympic gold in 2002 and 2010.
Australia has three strong entrants this time — Laura Peel, Danielle Scott and Gabi Ash.
Bobsleigh hero used Instagram to recruit for Olympics
When bobsleigh pilot Axel Brown decided to switch from the Great Britain team to race for Trinidad and Tobago at the Winter Olympics, he needed to find a brakeman.
So Brown, who lives in the English town of Loughborough used Instagram to find one on the other side of the Atlantic.
“I slid into the DMs (direct messages),” Brown explained after ranking 25th of the 30 two-man teams in training Saturday.
“I knew that as a nation Trinidad and Tobago have a lot of speed, so I just started researching people.” Brown eventually came across Andre Marcano, a physical education teacher living in New York, who’s “a fast runner with good bodyweight for bobsleigh, and said ‘hey’.”
He admits Marcano was sceptical so “I had to be a little bit persistent, but it worked out because we’re at an Olympics.”
Marcano only started training for his new sport last October. In fact the first time he had ever been in a bobsleigh was when he arrived in Beijing for the Olympics.
“I can’t see, but I have to put my trust in him (Brown),” he said.
He described the thrill of thundering over the ice without being able to look out of the bobsleigh as “like a step above roller-coasters - I love that.”
While Jamaica will get most of the limelight in Beijing because of the bobsleigh tradition forged by the “Cool Runnings” film, the Trinidad and Tobago pair are the first athletes from their nation to compete at the Winter Games in 20 years.
“We’re the lesser known of the two Caribbean sleds. Jamaica, understandably, has all the attention, but we’re here for the first time in a while,” said Brown.
The two-man heats start Monday and the pair acknowledge they will not get near the medals podium.
“Our lofty goal, our gold medal as it were, would be to hit the top 20, to get a fourth run,” said Brown as only the top-ranked 20 teams get to race the final heat.
Winter Olympics delayed because of ... snow
Californian-born Chinese sensation Eileen Gu’s bid for a second gold medal at the Beijing Games was held up Sunday when women’s freeski slopestyle qualification was postponed because of heavy snow.
Elsewhere at the Games, the second of three training runs for the women’s downhill was cancelled.
Freestyle skier Gu, who won the women’s Big Air title in her Olympic debut last week, is competing in the freeski slopestyle and halfpipe events in Zhangjiakou, about 180 kilometres (110 miles) northwest of Beijing.
There was no official word on when slopestyle qualification would be rescheduled to.
It was originally set to start at 10:00am (0200 GMT) on Sunday, but was pushed back two hours before being postponed for the day as snow fell down.
The final is currently set to start at 9:30am on Monday.
The training run for women’s downhill skiing at the National Alpine Skiing centre in Yanqing, north of Beijing, had been scheduled for 11:00 am Sunday.
“Due to the snowfall the jury together with the organiser have decided to cancel today’s women’s downhill training,” it was announced.
It had been due to be held between the two legs of a medal event, the men’s giant slalom.
The first run of the giant slalom did go ahead.
Female racers have a third training run scheduled for Monday, with the downhill proper due on Tuesday.
EARLY HICCUP FOR BOBSLED BREE
Australia’s Bree Walker has posted the 10th fastest time in the opening heat of the women’s monobob at the Beijing Winter Olympics after going sideways into a wall at the top of her run.
Racing on the same twisting, icy track where her teammate Jackie Narracott won the silver medal in skeleton Saturday night, Walker stopped the clock at one minute 05.55 seconds in the first of her four heats.
That left the Australian 1.11 seconds behind the early leader, American Kaillie Humphries, who broke the track record with a smooth run of 1:04.44.
There are still three more heats to go, one more on Sunday then the last two on Monday, but Walker faces a big challenge getting back in medal contention because all four times are added together to decide the placings so there’s little room for error.
Walker had set the fastest time in three of the six training sessions and made a flying start to her first official run but lost valuable time when she slid into the wall at the top of the track known ‘the Dragon.
A former hurdler who has made a seamless transition to winter sports, Walker is competing in both the monobob and two-woman bobsleigh in China but her best prospects are in the solo event, which has been added to the Olympic program for the first time
Bobsled Bree’s gold chase inspired by Aussie skeleton hero
Inspired by her teammate Jackie Narracott, Australian bobsleigh driver Bree Walker is starting to feel bullish about her own chances at the Beijing Winter Olympics.
Narracott has been one of the breakout stars of the Aussie team in China and Walker says her stunning performances have given a lift to the entire team.
“I’m so excited for Jackie. We both moved away from Australia to pursue the sport, and it really shows that if you put your whole heart into something you can really be successful,” Walker said.
“It shows that Aussies can hold their own in the sliding world. We don’t have to be from these big North American or European nations.
“We can still be competitive up there, even though we’re not known for being winter athletes.”
Australia’s lone representative in monobob – or solo bobsleigh – Walker is rated as a genuine medal contender after setting the track alight during her training runs at the Yanqing National Sliding Centre.
She recorded the fastest time in three of the six practice runs, as well as the second quickest in the last hitout before the event gets underway on Sunday.
“I feel like everything has come together over the last few days. We’re trying out a few things to fix a few corners, and it’s all worked out. We’ve just got to go into the race and see what happens,” she said.
“I’ve pretty much figured out all the corners, it’s about putting the pieces of the puzzle together.”
A former hurdler who has made a seamless transition to winter sports, Walker is competing in both the monobob and two-woman bobsleigh in China but her best prospects are in the solo event, which has been added to the Olympic program for the first time.
“I feel that I’ve really matured as a driver just by being here. That’s what I’m addicted to and that’s what I love about the sport,” she said.
“I’m so proud of being part of this winter team where everyone is doing such a great job, and holding their own. It’s just really exciting times for our team.”
‘Catastrophic failure’: Russian drug cheat to learn Winters fate
The 15-year-old Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva will learn on Monday whether she can remain at the Beijing Olympics, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) said, as questions grew over why it took six weeks for her failed drug test to come to light.
The doping scandal surrounding the prodigious teenager threatens to tarnish the Games after the build-up was overshadowed by concerns about Covid and human rights in China.
Valieva’s Beijing Olympic fate is now in the hands of CAS, which will hold a hearing on Sunday.
“It is anticipated that the decision will be notified to the parties in the afternoon of Monday, 14 February,” the top sports tribunal said in a statement.
That is just one day before Valieva is scheduled to compete in the women’s individual competition.
Valieva, who starred as Russia won team gold in Beijing on Monday, tested positive for the banned substance trimetazidine after competing at an event in Saint Petersburg on December 25.
However, the International Testing Agency says the World Anti-Doping Agency-accredited laboratory in Stockholm only reported that Valieva had returned a positive case on February 8 — the day after she won team gold.
In an interview with AFP, United States Anti-Doping Agency chief Travis Tygart questioned the delay.
“The failure to report a test taken in December until after the team event in the Games is a catastrophic failure of the system to protect the public, the integrity of the Games and clean athletes who had to compete,” Tygart said.
Russia’s anti-doping agency RUSADA said it had been informed that a sharp rise of Covid-19 infections at the start of the year was to blame for the delay.
Valieva practised in Beijing on Saturday.
The president of the Russian Figure Skating Federation, Alexander Gorchkov, said: “We have no doubts about the honesty of our athlete.
“We have to find out … what happened to the December 25 doping sample almost a month and a half after it was sent to a foreign laboratory.” The case is just the latest doping scandal surrounding Russian athletes at Olympic Games in recent years, which led to Russia as a country being banned for two years.
Russian competitors are taking part in Beijing under the flag of the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC), providing have been able to prove they were not tainted by a massive state-sponsored doping program focused on the 2014 Sochi Olympics.
Laura bins baby ga-ga and dons the jump suit
She worked at Babies R Us and also in a Canberra computer repair shop in between university studies when Laura Peel had an epiphany.
“There must be more to life,’’ she thought, recalling how in 2002 Alissa Camplin, a former gymnast had won the Olympic gold medal in aerials.
Having trained as a competitive gymnast up until 2007 the Canberra athlete also had strong ski background through her mother, Teresa Harrington, who would take the entire family on regular winter sports holidays.
“So I rang the Olympic Winter Institute of Australia,’’ said Peel, 32, and that instinctive desire for something more challenging and exciting, changed her life immediately.
Instead of advising new parents on the virtues of various pram models, Peel was learning how to launch herself metres into the air with skis on.
Geoff Lipshut, now the Australian chef de mission, is the driving force of the Australian aerials program and actively sought out gymnasts because of their spatial awareness to twist and turn high in the air.
Within months Peel was travelling with the Australian squad, and in her first camp was rooming with Lydia Ierodiaconou (now Lassila), who months later went on to win the 2010 Vancouver Olympic gold medal.
“I was in awe of her but looking back, I was probably oblivious to everything that went into her daily training,’’ Peel said. “It was very inspiring from beginning: as a young athlete I wanted to follow their footsteps and wanted to uphold that performance of Australian aerial skiing; I was very lucky right from the beginning I saw what it took to be the best, even though I missed a lot of it at the time.”
Peel took a big step after the PyeongChang Olympics, linking up with a new coach Mich Roth, the 58-year-old former aerialist and ex-Swiss national coach.
“Mich likes to keep things simple. Aerial skiing is difficult but it’s not super complicated and people sometimes try to complicate it, he keeps simple and delivers it calmly,” she said.
If Peel’s in run or take off is askew, she has Roth beside the kicker telling her to stretch or pull to adjust mid air in order to make a clean landing. Also on the hill is the former Australian aerialist David Morris.
“Mich also trusts me, we train a lot and practice so that I make the right decisions in the air. The coach is the backup, I have to be confident in the air but the coach can help you if something go wrong,’’ she said.
With that trust has come more difficult tricks and Peel is the only woman on the world cup circuit to have included a triple twisting trick in every competition this season, regardless of the weather conditions.
In the most recent world cup finale at Deer Valley, Peel also landed a quadruple twisting triple backflip (a back full-full-full), only previously tackled by Lassila and the American world champion Ashley Caldwell.
Her rivals have been put on notice that the highest flying and most difficult twisting tricks will be pulled out for the Olympics.
After that competition Peel, Australia’s other medal contender Danielle Scott, as well as youngster Gabi Ash went to Quebec for pre-Olympic training in minus 20 degree conditions that replicated the extreme cold in Zhangjiakou.
“It was to consolidate everything and feel comfortable on all my tricks and to work on consistency. I want to be able to do any jump when I need to. I have done a lot of work and it’s reassuring,’’ she said.
Peel said that when she nails a take off it feels like she has a lot of time in the air to think about her manoeuvres.
“Three seconds feels like a lot of time if I am comfortable with jump,” she said.
“It is only doing something new or I am nervous and something goes wrong on take off, I go into autopilot survival mode.’’
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Even though Peel knows she has the big tricks available, she knows her competitors have been working on theirs too. The Olympic qualifying rounds will take place on Sunday night and the main competition on Monday.
During training at Zhangjiakou this week Peel has already completed triple twisting triple backflips and was working up to the bigger kicker jump for some quad practice.
She said: “I am very excited. The games always has a way of taking forever and then suddenly arriving as well. The Olympics is the pinnacle of our sport, we live in four year cycles, and I happy that given the Tokyo Olympics delay for a year, that the Games are on and we can compete.”
Originally published as Winter Olympics 2022: Latest results and news from Beijing
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