Michaela Dorfmeister capped her skiing career by becoming the first Austrian woman since 1980 to win the Olympic downhill title.
Dorfmeister finished 0.37 seconds ahead of silver medalist Martina Schild of Switzerland. World Cup overall champion Anja Paerson of Sweden won bronze in a race in which three of the first 12 skiers crashed because of poor visibility caused by a looming snowstorm in the mountains outside Turin.
“I didn’t sleep for two nights because I was under so much pressure,” Dorfmeister told reporters. “That elusive medal was probably the thing that has kept me skiing.” Dorfmeister will retire next month after adding an Olympic title to a medal collection that already included World Cup and World Championship golds. The World Cup downhill champion’s previous best Olympics result was silver in the 1998 super giant slalom, when she finished 0.01 second behind Picabo Street of the U.S.
Norway continues to lead the medal standings with 11, two more than Russia and four more than the U.S. and Germany. The U.S. leads with five gold medals.
Dorfmeister, the 2001 world downhill champion, completed the nearly two-mile course in one minute, 56.49 seconds. The 32-year-old didn’t have to contend with Croatia’s Janica Kostelic, a three-time gold medalist at the last Olympics, who pulled out of the race at San Sicario Fraiteve with a fast pulse and flu-like symptoms.
Lindsey Kildow of the U.S. finished eighth a day after being released from the hospital while defending Olympic champion Carole Montillet-Carles of France was more than four seconds adrift of the winner after also crashing in training.
Dorfmeister, the 2002 overall World Cup champion, was almost caught by Paerson, who took the lead midway through the course before losing time at the bottom.
The weather also took its toll elsewhere on the fifth day of competition in northern Italy, with the Nordic combined postponed because of high winds. A new start date will be determined later today, with results of the first portion of the ski jump wiped out, the U.S. Olympic Committee said in a statement.
Vancouver-born Dale Begg-Smith, seeking to add a gold medal to a fortune estimated by newspapers at $40 million, led qualifying for the men’s moguls final later today. The 21-year-old made his money as president of AdsCPM Network, which buys pop-up advertising rights to Web sites.
World Cup leader Begg-Smith, representing Australia after moving there as a teenager, led 2002 silver medalist Travis Cabral of the U.S. and Canada’s Marc-Andre Moreau.
In other medal events today, Germany will seek to defend its title in the men’s double luge, while China’s Wang Meng is favored in short-track speedskating’s 500 meters.
Calgary Flames captain Jarome Iginla, the leading National Hockey League scorer in 2001-02, got two of Canada’s goals as it began the defense of its ice hockey title with a 7-2 win over Italy.
The favorite scored five second-period goals to snap a 1-1 tie.
Canada’s preparation has been hampered by a gambling scandal implicating Janet Jones, the wife of team executive director Wayne Gretzky, the NHL’s all-time leading scorer who denies any wrongdoing.
Sweden opened the tournament with a 7-2 win over Kazakhstan while the U.S., seeking a first gold medal since it beat the Soviet Union at Lake Placid, New York, in 1980, faces Latvia in the last match today.
