US ski star Mikaela Shiffrin suffered more Winter Olympic heartbreak on Tuesday as Ukrainian athlete Vladyslav Heraskevych vowed to continue wearing a banned helmet depicting victims of the war with Russia.
On the ice in Milan, US figure-skating sensation Ilia Malinin further burnished his growing reputation as he closed in on a second gold medal in his debut Games.
America’s top team of Shiffrin and individual downhill champion Breezy Johnson were firm favourites to win the women’s team combined event in Cortina d’Ampezzo after Johnson topped the times in the morning’s downhill run.
But Shiffrin stuttered through the slalom — her specialist event — and the US pair finished in a disappointing fourth place, with Austrians Ariane Raedler and Katharina Huber claiming gold.
Defeat will sting for 30-year-old Shiffrin, who is the most successful World Cup skier of all time and came into the Games in red-hot form.
The two-time Olympic gold medallist had a point to prove after a disastrous showing at the 2022 Beijing Games, where she failed to win a single medal.
But Shiffrin was a full second slower than Emma Aicher, whose session-leading time of 44.38sec gave Germany silver while another US pairing, Jacqueline Wiles and Paula Moltzan, took bronze.
The American said she would learn from her disappointing run, which cranks up the pressure ahead of next week’s slalom, the final alpine skiing event of the Games.
“I didn’t quite find a comfort level that like allows me to produce full speed, so I’m going to have to learn what to do, what to adjust in the short time we have before the other tech races,” she said.
Shiffrin’s poor performance denied Johnson a second gold of the Games after she triumphed in the downhill on Sunday, when Lindsey Vonn suffered a broken leg in a brutal crash.
Vonn, 41, who had been expected to share star billing with Shiffrin at the Milan-Cortina Games, revealed on Monday she had suffered a “complex tibia fracture” when she crashed in the downhill and would need “multiple surgeries to fix properly”.
– Helmet row –
Away from the ski slopes, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) banned Ukrainian skeleton racer Heraskevych from wearing a helmet that features pictures of sportspeople killed since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, but has allowed him to wear a black armband instead.
IOC spokesperson Mark Adams said the headwear contravened guidelines but that the IOC would “make an exception to the guidelines to allow him to wear a black armband during competition to make that commemoration”.
Gestures of a political nature during competition are forbidden under the Olympic charter, though athletes are permitted to express their views in press conferences and on social media.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky had defended Heraskevych’s right to wear the helmet, thanking him “for reminding the world of the price of our struggle”.
And the athlete, who was one of Ukraine’s two flag bearers in the opening ceremony in Italy, told reporters at the Cortina Sliding Centre that he had no intention of backing down.
“I used it in all trainings… I used it today, I will use it tomorrow, and I will use it on race day (Thursday),” he told reporters.
Heraskevych said he disagreed with the IOC’s decision “because I truly believe that we didn’t violate any rules”.
In a strongly worded Instagram post he said: “Even though the IOC wants to betray the memory of these athletes, I will not betray them.”
Ukrainian Sports Minister Matviy Bidnyi told AFP this month that Russia has killed “more than 650 athletes and coaches” since it invaded Ukraine, according to the latest data.
In late-evening action, figure skater Malinin, unbeaten in individual competition for two years, performed his trademark backflip to top the standings in the short programme of the singles competition, delighting the crowd.
The 21-year-old, with the team title already under his belt, is well placed to win gold after Friday’s free skating section.
Earlier Tuesday, Norwegian cross-country skier Johannes Klaebo added a seventh Olympic gold to his career haul as Norway stayed top of the medals table with six golds.
In the Olympic women’s ice hockey preliminary round, the United States hammered reigning champions Canada 5-0.
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