Olympics-Alpine skiing-Austria’s Mayer claims historic gold in men’s super-G

February 8, 2022

By Simon Evans

YANQING, China (Reuters) -Austria’s Matthias Mayer became the first man to win an Alpine skiing gold medal in three consecutive Olympic Games after winning the super-G at the Beijing Games on Tuesday.

Mayer, who won gold in downhill in Sochi in 2014 and super-G in Pyeongchang four years ago, raced down ‘The Rock’ in a time of 1:19.94 with American Ryan Cochran-Siegle just four hundredths of a second behind him.

Norway’s Aleksander Aamodt Kilde, the World Cup super-G leader, had to settle for a bronze medal.

Mayer had picked up bronze in Tuesday’s downhill but got his hands on gold with a stunning final stage to his run where he made up the decisive time to move ahead of Kilde.

Cochran-Siegle has just one career win on the World Cup circuit but threatened to push Mayer into second with an aggressive run that earned him a surprise silver.

The 31-year-old Mayer’s achievement puts him in the pantheon of Alpine ski greats.

In women’s skiing, Italy’s Deborah Compagnoni won Olympic gold in super-G in 1992 and giant slalom in 1994 and 1998.

Mayer’s gold also makes him the first skier, male or female, to win gold in three successive Olympics purely in speed events.

His three golds also take him level with Toni Sailer in Austria’s list of Olympic winners in Alpine skiing.

(Reporting by Simon Evans, additional reporting by Simon Jennings and Shadia Nasralla, Editing by Peter Rutherford)