Today in a nutshell: Men’s downhill honours went to Beat Feuz of Switzerland as Kamila Valieva produced another world-first figure skating performance
Next up: Later today the curling mixed doubles reaches the semi-final stage, and we’ll see the mixed ski jumping. Tomorrow’s early action features the men’s Super-G and a US v Canada ice hockey face-off
Beat Feuz of Switzerland is the king of the mountain, winning the men’s downhill by just 0.10 seconds ahead of 41-year-old Johan Clarey of France, who became the oldest man to win an Olympic medal in Alpine skiing. “I can’t think of anything more beautiful than flying home with a gold medal around my neck,” said Feuz.
Sweden’s Sara Hector won the women’s giant slalom in two runs either side of the rescheduled men’s downhill. Hector said: “It’s been so much all day. I’ve been so nervous. It’s so much feeling, it’s crazy. It’s for sure a lot of joy.”
Italy’s Federica Brignone took silver and Switzerland’s Lara Gut-Behrami bronze. Mikaela Shiffrin’s bid for a record medal haul got off to a rocky start when she missed a gate early in the first run and was DQ’d, and the race was halted for 15 worrying minutes while her compatriot Nina O’Brien was stretchered off after a crash. A US team spokesperson has since said she is “alert and responsive”.
Fifteen-year-old Kamila Valieva landed the first quad by a woman in Olympic competition, as the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) claimed their expected gold in the team figure skating. The US took silver, Japan the bronze. “I’m very happy to land two quadruple jumps and a triple axel. It’s an incredible feeling to be skating in your first senior season and people are already talking about you,” Valieva said.
Lightning nearly struck twice in two days in the speed skating as Japan’s Miho Takagi looked set to take gold with a new Olympic record on the final run of the women’s 1,500m – just as Nils van der Poel did in the men’s 5,000m yesterday. However, she made a tiny error in the final run-in, which meant Ireen Wüst’s agonising wait ended with another gold for the Netherlands and her brand new Olympic record left standing. Takagi ended up with silver, Antoinette de Jong of the Netherlands took bronze.
Canada’s failure to beat Italy in their final mixed doubles curling match confirmed this evening’s semi-final lineup will see a still-unbeaten Italian pair face Sweden, while Norway and Great Britain have an instant rematch of the game Norway won 6-2 yesterday.
Canada enjoyed success in the men’s slopestyle snowboarding though, with a gold for Max Parrot and a third consecutive Olympic bronze for Mark McMorris. China’s Su Yiming snuck in for silver and the hosts’ second medal of the Games. “I don’t know how to express my feeling. I have never felt such feelings in my life,” Su said.
Parrot won silver at Pyeongchang in 2018, then had to take time away from sport after being diagnosed with Hodgkin lymphoma. “I was going through a true nightmare,” Parrot said. “And just the thought of snowboarding was my dream at that point.”
Things you might have missed
Yesterday’s late medals included Johannes Ludwig of Germany winning the men’s singles luge, while Ryoyu Kobayashi of Japan won the men’s normal hill ski jumping. Jakara Anthony became Australia’s first Winter Olympics gold medallist since 2010, winning the freestyle skiing women’s moguls. She said: “It’s all still sinking in but I was so grateful to be able to celebrate with my team last night and share the experience with Tess [Coady], both getting podiums on the same day.”
Canada’s women’s ice hockey match with the ROC was delayed by an hour before players returned to the ice wearing face masks. No reason was given, but Canadian media reported ROC had not provided Canada with their Covid test results. Canada won 6-1. In the other match so far today, Denmark have given themselves hope of progressing by recording their first victory, 3-2 over the Czech Republic.
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The briefing’s picture of the day
A lot of athletes struggled with the fourth shooting round as Denise Herrmann prevailed in the women’s 15km biathlon to win Germany’s second gold. Despite picking up one shooting penalty, she finished 9.4 seconds ahead of France’s Anais Chevalier-Bouchet.
What to look out for next
Times are all in local Beijing time. For Sydney it is +3 hours, for London it is -8 hours, for New York it is -13 hours and San Francisco is -16 hours.
Later today – Monday 7 February
8.41pm Short track speed skating – the women’s 500m and men’s 1,000m have finals 🥇
8.51pm Ski jumping – the conclusion of the first ever mixed team competition 🥇
9.10pm Ice hockey – China’s women can book a quarter-final berth with a positive result over Sweden in Group B. Switzerland face Finland in Group A – neither side has won a match yet 🏒
9.30pm Luge – the day with the second run of the women’s singles
Tomorrow – Tuesday 8 February
10am Freestyle skiing – another new event as it is the first ever Olympic women’s Freeski Big Air contest 🥇
10.40am – 3.43pm Snowboard – both the men’s and women’s parallel giant slalom will be decided today 🥇
11am Alpine skiing – the men’s Super-G 🥇
12.10pm and 4.40pm and 9.10pm Ice hockey – the day opens with the US and Canada clashing in the preliminary round. Both countries are guaranteed a place in the quarter-finals but will be wanting to lay down a marker 🏒
2.05pm and 8.05pm Curling – the bronze medal match and then the final in the mixed doubles could deliver Team GB’s first medal of the Games 🥇
4pm – 8pm Cross-country skiing – the women’s and men’s sprint free competition runs all afternoon and into the early evening in Beijing 🥇
4.30pm Biathlon – today it is the turn of the men to do their 20km individual race 🥇
6.30pm Speed skating – on Tuesday the men race in the 1,500m🥇
7.50pm and 9.35pm Luge – runs three and four of the women’s singles will decide the medals 🥇
Full Winter Olympics schedule | Results, sport by sport | Medal table
How things stand
Here’s what the emoji table looked like at 6.45pm Beijing time …
1 🇸🇪 Sweden 🥇 3 🥈 0 🥉 0 total: 3
2 ◻️ Not Russia 🥇 2 🥈 2 🥉 2 total: 6
3 🇳🇱 Netherlands 🥇 2 🥈 1 🥉 1 total: 4
4 🇩🇪 Germany 🥇 2 🥈 1 🥉 0 total: 3
5 🇳🇴 Norway 🥇 2 🥈 0 🥉 2 total: 4
6= 🇨🇦 Canada 🥇 1 🥈 1 🥉 2 total: 4
6= 🇯🇵 Japan 🥇 1 🥈 1 🥉 2 total: 4
8 🇨🇳 China 🥇 1 🥈 1 🥉 0 total: 2
9= 🇦🇺 Australia 🥇 1🥈 0 🥉 1 total: 2
9= 🇸🇮 Slovenia 🥇 1🥈 0 🥉 1 total: 2
9= 🇨🇭 Switzerland 🥇 1🥈 0 🥉 1 total: 2
Don’t forget you can get in touch at martin.belam@theguardian.com.
The last word
Yeah, I think really that he had a few too many drinks at that point, but you can’t really blame him, it was Waitangi Day in New Zealand and his daughter just won the Olympics so …!” – Zoi Sadowski-Synnott, New Zealand’s first ever Winter Olympics gold medallist, responds after her well-refreshed dad goes viral for telling a TV interview “I’m pretty fucking excited, to be honest” in the wake of her victory.
