Olympic Skiing Gold For Britain
Olympic Skiing Gold For Britain
Published : 16-Feb-2016 08:08
Britain got its first ever Olympic Gold medal in snowsports on Sunday – but not many people heard about it because our winner was just 15 years old and was competing at the Winter Youth Olympic Games in Norway.
GB Park and Pipe skier Madi Rowlands (Maidstone) made history as she became the first ever Team GB athlete to win a Youth Olympic medal, taking gold in the Ski Halfpipe at Lillehammer 2016.
The second ever Winter Youth Olympic Games have had littler publicity in mainstream media, they follow the inaugural Games in Innsbruck in 2012.
Rowlands dominated the field throughout and put down the best two runs of the competition at Oslo's Vinterpark, notching up a score of 88.60 in her second run.
"I couldn't be happier. It's just so overwhelming," said Rowlands. "It was nerve-wracking to wait for the others to finish but I felt like I had done enough. I was so stoked with that first run and to land it like I did meant I was able to relax more and not be so nervous in the second and third. There are two main competitions I ultimately want to get to, the X Games and then the Olympics. This is a great step towards that and I'm just so stoked to win."
In the senior competition, a day earlier and across the Atlantic, 18-year old Katie Ormerod had a huge result in Quebec, Canada, taking second at the FIS World Cup Big Air. Beating all but one other (American Jamie Anderson) in a world class field, she took second spot with a backside 7 and backflip.
"So excited to be on my first World Cup podium here in Quebec City for the Big Air! Stoked on 2nd place," posted Katie.
She is now in Korea along with her GB Park and Pipe teammates for the PyeongChang FIS Ski and Snowboard Slopestyle World Cup this coming weekend, which is also a test event for the 2018 Winter Olympics.
Back in Scandinavia Aimee Fuller made it a triple success with her second place finish at the Ale Invite Big Air event in Sweden.
At the World Snowboard Tour event, which takes place in Alebacken, Fuller was on form, beating a strong field, but sitting just behind Klaudia Medlova from Slovakia.
Other Brits competing in the Winter Youth Olympic Games included Yasmin Cooper and Iain Innes who had their first taste of Youth Olympic competition in the Super-G event.
Cooper finished the Super-G in 19th and came down the slalom 16th quickest to finish 13th overall, while 17-year-old Innes from Edinburgh finished 32nd.
"I thought it went really well today. I made a bit of a mistake coming into the finish and probably lost a second or so but overall really happy," said Innes.
Madi Rowlands will go again to compete in the Ski Slopestyle on Friday. Cal Sandieson (17, Glasgow) competes in the Ski Slopestyle on Saturday.
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