Kirsty Muir falls agonisingly short again with fourth place in big air

If Muir, who learnt her skiing on the dry slope at Garthdee in Aberdeen, made a mistake it was her conservative jump in the first round. The big air event is a three-jump competition, the sum of the best two scores for each competitor constituting their final position. Muir’s mediocre first score left her in seventh place and put pressure on her to shoot for the moon in her next two.

With the pressure on, though, Muir delivered. For her second jump she attempted a double 16, a 4½ rotation jump that she landed backwards. No one had attempted a 16 in Olympic competition since Eileen Gu unveiled it in Beijing four years ago, a jump that took her to gold.

Muir’s jump was so good that it shifted her up to second. In the third round, though, Gu edged ahead of her, knocking her into third.

Then came Flora Tabanelli, an 18-year-old local who was competing with a torn anterior cruciate ligament. The Italian borrowed straight from Muir’s book of tricks, went for the double 16 and landed it so cleanly that she recorded the highest score of the night to move into the bronze-medal position and knock Muir into fourth.

Muir had one last attempt to push her way back up into the medals. Again, she went for broke but this time she failed to land the jump, sealing her fate of a pair of fourth-placed finishes.

Afterwards, she refused to be too downhearted. “I’m especially proud of this one, because I really, really, really did go for it,” she said. “On the third run I went for a trick I haven’t landed before and gave it my all. I’m taking that with me.”

The gold was won by Megan Oldham of Canada, who led the competition from the first round. She was so good she was never really in the battle for medals — she was way out ahead of it.

Those in that battle below her made this competition an intriguing examination of nerves, audacity and the ability to deliver in the biggest moment. Tabanelli did exactly that. Muir did it once but couldn’t manage it when the heat was really on the second time.

Gu was the fascinating one. The 23-year-old is the highest-earning athlete here at these Games — behind three leading tennis players, Coco Gauff, Aryna Sabalenka and Iga Swiatek, she is the fourth-highest-earning female athlete in the world.

She makes only about $100,000 (£73,000) in prize money a year from her skiing, the rest of her $23million annual income last year was from her glittering portfolio of sponsors. Her USP is that she lives in America and lives a very American lifestyle, but because of her Chinese mother, she competes for China. This makes her a big attraction in the two biggest markets on the planet.

But none of that star appeal sticks if you cannot land the big jumps in the biggest moments of your life. Gu did just that. Muir will return home with the most painful of regrets.

Norwegian skier storms off after slalom crash

After grasping defeat from the jaws of victory, a Norwegian slalom skier chucked away his ski poles and trudged off into the woods to release his fury (Owen Slot writes).

Atle Lie McGrath, the Norwegian, was hardly given any time to engage in his own personal fury because he quickly found that police and photographers had come in hot pursuit.

McGrath had been leading the men’s slalom after the first round. Indeed, his lead, which was 0.59 seconds, put him handsomely clear and required, at the very least, a safe second run on the Stelvio course in Bormio to claim the gold medal.

However, he straddled a gate high up the course and that was when he threw his poles and dived off into the course-side pines.

“I just needed to get away from everything,” the 25-year-old said. “I thought I would get some peace and quiet, which I didn’t because photographers and police found me out in the woods. I just needed some time for myself.”

McGrath later explained that he had experienced “a mix of shock and everything inbetween, a surreal feeling. I haven’t really experienced anything like it before.”

He then explained that his behaviour was probably related to the death of his grandfather, who had died on the day of the Winter Olympics opening ceremony.

“I’m normally a guy that’s very good when it comes to perspective on things,” he said. “If I don’t ski well in a race, I can at least tell myself that I’m healthy and my family’s healthy, and the people I love are here. So that’s nice, but that’s not been the case. I’ve lost someone I love so much, and that makes it really hard.

“Sports-wise, it’s the worst. It’s not the worst moment of my life, but it’s the worst moment of my career, and it’s been one of the toughest moments of my life with everything that’s been going on.

“I was hoping I was going to be able to crown off this tough period with something good today. I had to really stand through so much tough stuff and stay really strong. That makes it an extra tough one.

“It’s hard to think that the next time I’ll be able to ski the Olympics, I will be 29 years old and not 25. I gave myself the absolute best opportunity today, and I skied so great and I still couldn’t get it done, so that’s what really hurts.”

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