Enlarge image
Shaun White in his final Olympic appearance
Photo: Cameron Spencer/Getty Images
The seventh day of competition at the Olympic Games in Beijing brought the seventh German gold medal, and it was a historic one: world champion
Christopher Grotheer
won the first Olympic
skeleton
gold for Germany in the Yanqing Sliding Centre.
After four confident runs, he won ahead of his teammate
Axel Jungk
and the Chinese Yan Wengang.
With a clear lead of 0.66 seconds over his teammate Jungk, Grotheer raced to Olympic victory.
His 45-kilogram sled was the fastest in the field at over 130 km/h, and Grotheer is still driving the model from last year.
Snowboard
superstar Shaun White
left the Olympic stage without a medal.
The 35-year-old American jumped
fourth in the last
halfpipe competition of his career.
World Cup leader Ayumu Hirano
(96.00 points)
secured gold in Zhangjiakou's Genting Snow Park . It was Japan's first ever Olympic victory in snowboarding.
The three-time world champion Scotty James (92.50) from Australia took silver, bronze went to the Swiss Jan Scherrer (87.25).
In 2006, 2010 and 2018, White (85.00) had left all the competition behind, in Beijing he missed becoming the first athlete to win four individual golds at four different Winter Games.
Five days after his victory over 5000 meters, the Swede Nils van der Poel
secured
his second
speed skating gold
with a world record over 10,000 meters .
The 25-year-old won in 12:30.74 minutes, beating his own record by 2.21 seconds at the National Speed Skating Oval.
Patrick Roest from the Netherlands finished second in 12:44.59 minutes.
The Italian Davide Ghiotto, who ran in a direct duel with the world record holder in 12:45.98 minutes, secured bronze.
Patrick Beckert finished seventh with a time of 13:01.23 minutes.
After Denise Herrmann's gold medal in the individual race, the German biathletes
fell short of expectations in the
sprint race .
As the best German, Vanessa Voigt was just 18th in the top 20, Herrmann had to settle for 22nd place.
Marte Olsbu Røiseland claimed
her second gold medal in Beijing after winning the Norwegian mixed relay.
The eleven-time world champion won ahead of Swede Elvira Öberg and Dorothea Wierer from Italy.
Like four years ago,
the Dutch
short tracker Suzanne Schulting won Olympic gold in the
1000 meters
in Pyeongchang .
In Beijing, the eight-time world champion prevailed in an exciting final by a hair's breadth ahead of South Korea's Choi Min-Jeong and Hanne Desmet from Belgium.
Desmet's bronze is only the second medal by a Belgian woman at the Winter Games after figure skater Micheline Lannoy, who won silver in 1948.
Ski racer
Lara
Gut-Behrami
crowned her great career with her first Olympic gold.
The 30-year-old double world champion from Switzerland won the
super-G
in Beijing after bronze in the giant slalom .
Behind Gut-Behrami, Mirjam Puchner from Austria and Michelle Gisin (Switzerland) finished on the podium.
"I'm trying to enjoy it, but it will take a few days before I understand it," said Gut-Behrami, who had already finished third in the 2014 Olympic downhill.
She will also be the favorite in the supreme alpine discipline on Tuesday (4 a.m.).
Finnish cross-country skier
Iivo Niskanen
won the
15-kilometer
race.
Curious: A day earlier, his sister Kerttu had finished second behind Therese Johaug in the women's race over 10 kilometers.
The 30-year-old Niskanen prevailed 23.2 seconds ahead of Alexander Bolshunov.
Bronze went to Norwegian Johannes Høsflot Klæbo.
For only the fourth time in history, a pair of siblings have won an individual medal at the same Winter Olympics.
In 1980 Eric and Beth Heiden (USA/speed skating) as well as Andreas and Hanni Wenzel (Liechtenstein/Alpine skiing) succeeded, in 2006 Ivica and Janica Kostelic (Croatia/Alpine skiing).
Kuchler gets lost
With Niskanen's victory, the German Olympic debutant
Albert Kuchler
caused a stir: he had turned off much too early towards the end of the race and had to turn around frantically - although he had been doing well up to that point.
"It's a story for the grandchildren," said national coach Peter Schlickenrieder.
Kuchler himself was somewhat at a loss: “That was a huge, careless mistake – I looked at the tracks again before the competition.
From the second lap I had a really bad conscience.” Despite extra meters, Kuchler still finished in 32nd place.
Ukrainian skeleton pilot
Vladislav Heraskevich
has sent a political message against a possible war in his homeland.
After the third run on Friday, the 23-year-old showed the cameras a self-made note in the national colors of Ukraine with the inscription »No war in Ukraine« (»No war in Ukraine«)
in the finish area of the Yanqing ice track
.
Political messages are prohibited for participants in Olympic competitions.
Here you can find the schedule, dates and sports of the Olympic Winter Games at a glance.
mfu/sid/dpa