The third day of competition at the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics is underway, and fittingly there are three Australians in action.
It comes after a stunning Sunday delivered two Australian medals – our best-ever day in Winter Games history.
Follow all the action with our live updates here!
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US STAR’S SHOCK UPSET
One of the biggest names of the Winter Olympics, US star Mikaela Shiffrin, saw her campaign get off to a horror start when she failed to complete her run in the women’s giant slalom
The defending champion managed just a couple of gates before running wide and failing to finish. Skiers make two runs in the giant slalom, with their score based on the combined times of both runs – meaning Shiffrin is out of the running.
Shiffrin has four more races these Olympics, including her best event, the slalom.
But she was seen as a strong chance to medal – if not claim gold – in the giant slalom.
It is a hammer blow for Shiffrin, who also won slalom gold at the 2014 Sochi Games, and the 26-year-old will now have to quickly refocus on Wednesday’s slalom.
The American had complained before the race that she had just two days of giant slalom training in the three months between the World Cup season opener in Soelden, Austria, and the meet in the French resort of Courchevel in December.
“I got the bulk of my GS training for the entire season in the last four days here in Beijing,” she said.
“That’s not ideal but I think my skiing’s in a pretty good place.”
Australian alpine skier Katie Parker was forced to miss the women’s giant slalom after Covid-19 delayed her departure.
“Parker had previously contracted Covid in the United States prior to her planned departure for Beijing,” an AOC statement read.
“Ongoing positive tests delayed her departure until she was able to complete two negative tests at 96 and 72 hours and will be flying out to arrive Tuesday.”
Parker will contest the women’s slalom on Wednesday.
KIWI DAD’S ALL-TIME INTERVIEW
Snowboarder Zoi Sadowski-Synnott claimed New Zealand’s first-ever Winter Olympic gold medal with victory in the women’s slopestyle – only for her dad to steal the limelight with a hilarious interview.
Sean Synott dropped two f-bombs on live TV in NZ, telling Newshub: “The only thing I looked for was her younger sister’s reaction. She was (going) f***ing crazy, she was going off the roof.
“I’m pretty f***ing excited, to be honest, and I’m really happy to see all the investment from all of these people has turned out.”
Things got even weirder when the interviewer asked how hard Zoi had worked to reach the top.
“Well the toilet blocked up this morning, ah, yesterday morning,” Sean Synott said bizarrely.
Zoi’s brother also took to TV later in the day for a brilliant interview of his own, proudly declaring: “I’m at totally new levels of stokedness!”
SKELETON STARS IN ACTION
31-year-old Jaclyn Narracott has kicked off her Olympics campaign in the women’s skeleton, laying down a great first training run of 1:03.09s, topping out at 122.8km/h to finish the run 11th.
In her second run, she topped out at 125.4km/h and improved her time by nearly half a second to finish in 1:02.62s, which was good enough for a stunning third in the second runs.
China’s Dan Zhao had the best time of the day with 1:02.18s, while four other sliders went faster than Narracott’s best over the two sessions.
Each competitor has six training runs in the next couple of days before the competition proper begins on the 11th.
Narracott finished 16th on debut in 2018, the same Olympics that her husband and fellow skeleton slider Dom Parsons of Great Britain claimed bronze.
Her uncle, Paul Narracott, is also a legendary slider. He was the first Australian to compete at both the Summer (Los Angeles, 1984) and Winter Olympic Games (Albertville, 1992), in athletics and bobsleigh respectively.
Australia’s Nicholas Timmings is also taking his first two official training runs, from 3.25pm.
31-year-old Timmings is coming off a best-ever World Cup result of 19th in Altenberg in December 2021.
He also has a twin brother Dean, who competed in skeleton in World Championships in 2016 and 2017!
THE NEXT BRADBURY?
Australia has won just two medals in short-track speed skating – bronze in 1994 Lillehammer in the men’s 5000 metres relay, in which Steven Bradbury participated, and his stunning solo success in the 1000m individual competition in 2002.
Now Brendan Corey is looking to follow in his footsteps as he contests the finals tonight.
On his Olympic debut, Canadian-born Corey clocked one minute 23.908 seconds — an Australian record — to finish second in the eighth heat on Saturday night at Beijing’s Capital Indoor Stadium.
“It’s just the nature of short track, anything can happen. It’s an awesome story he has, and I’m hoping to have Australia known for somebody else other than Bradbury and his amazing finish,” Corey said after Saturday night’s race.
Speaking of Monday’s races, he said: “I know what I need to do, and I’m ready for it.”
AUSSIE SCHEDULE
SKELETON: Women’s training runs one and two from 12.40pm.
Men’s training runs one and two from 3.25pm.
SPEED SKATING: 10:44pm – Men’s 1000m quarter-finals (Brendan Corey quarter-final three)
– Followed by semi-finals from 11.20pm then Final B at 11.52pm or Final A at 11.58pm.