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Svindal earns bronze in GS to match Miller with three medals

Alpine The biggest story of the Olympic alpine races, until Tuesday, had been American Bode Miller.

Alpine

The biggest story of the Olympic alpine races, until Tuesday, had been American Bode Miller.

Miller came into the Games under the radar with only a handful of good results on the World Cup tour in recent years, but wrapped up the speed events with three medals - bronze in downhill, silver in super-G and gold in the super combined.

But his medal run came to an end in Tuesday's giant slalom. Miller did not finish his first run.

The race was won by Switzerland's Carlo Janka. Norwegians Kjetil Jansrud and Aksel Lund Svindal took the silver and bronze medals. The bronze was Svindal's third medal of these Games. Like Miller, he has one of each, having won the super-G and finishing second in the downhill.

Erik Guay continued to be the best Canadian male skier. After placing fifth in both the downhill and super-G he was 16 th in the GS.

The Americans have been dominant in the speed races. Lindsey Vonn has a gold in the downhill and a bronze in the super G, while Julia Mancuso earned silver medals in both the downhill and super combined.

With the super-G bronze by Andrew Weibrecht - his first podium ever - the U.S. Team now has eight medals to its credit, its best showing ever in a Winter Olympics and it's not over yet.

Alpine Canada was expecting at least two medals from these Olympics. That is unlikely to happen now; Michael Janyk in Saturday's slalom is the only realistic remaining hope for a medal.

However, the margin some Canadians have missed medals by is heartbreaking. Guay was three one-hundredths of a second away from the bronze medal in super-G. At the Torino Olympics in 2006 he missed the bronze in the same event by one one-hudredth of a second.

Britt Janyk placed sixth in the women's downhill and 17 th in the super-G after pulling out of what could have been a terrible crash.

The once-powerful Austrian team has just two medals in alpine events, with Elisabeth Goergl placing third in the downhill and Andrea Fischbacher winning the women's super-G.

 

Freestyle

The men's aerials qualification was on Monday, Feb. 23, with all three Canadians qualifying for the finals - Warren Shouldice in sixth place, Steve Omischl in eighth and Kyle Nissen in ninth. The ladies final was on Wednesday, Feb. 24 and the men's final is Thursday, Feb. 25.

 

Snowboard

The last event is the parallel giant slalom. The women are up first on Feb. 26, followed by the men's event the following day.

 

Cross-Country

The Canadian team has so far been shut out of the medals in cross-country, but the team has come close on a few occasions and the men's team could still factor in the 4x10 km relay on Thursday and the 50 km mass start classic race on Sunday.

After a slow start the Swedish team is back in the hunt with five medals, and is now tied with the surging Norwegian team. Russia and Germany have two medals each.

Sara Renner placed 10 th in the women's 15 km pursuit race, while Daria Gaiazova and Renner were seventh in the team sprint.

Remaining events are the men's 4x10 km relay on Feb. 24 (after press time), the women's 4x5 km relay on Feb. 25, the ladies' 30 km mass start classic on Feb. 27 and the men's 50 km on Feb. 28.

 

Biathlon

While Canadians are not serious contenders in this event we've come a long way in a few short years and should have a few medal hopefuls in the lineup for 2014.

The highlight so far is the performance of Jean-Philippe LeGuellec, who placed sixth out of 88 competitors in the men's 10 km sprint, 11 th in the men's 12.5 km pursuit and 13 th in the men's 20 km individual race. The top female was Squamish's Megan Tandy, although she failed to crack the top 30 in any events.

The only remaining events are the women's 4x6 km relay on Feb. 23 and the men's 4x7.5 km relay on Feb. 26.

 

Nordic Combined

Only one event has taken place so far, with podiums going to France, the U.S. - a rising power in Nordic Combined - and Italy.

The team 4x5 km relay takes place on Feb. 23, followed by the individual long hill/10 km cross-country competition on Feb. 25.

 

Ski Jumping

The ski jumping calendar wrapped up on Monday with Austria winning the team competition, followed by Germany and Norway.

Swiss star Simon Ammann won gold in both the normal hill and long hill events, Adam Malysz of Poland won silver in both events and Gregor Schlierenzauer of Austria won bronze in both events, plus a gold in the team competition.

 

Sliding

Germany picked up gold and silver medals in the men's two-man bobsleigh, with Russia earning the bronze.

The women's bosleigh takes place Feb. 23-24, and the men's four-man bobsleigh on Feb. 26-27.

 

Speed Skating

Canada upped its speed skating medal tally to four on Monday with Kristina Groves picking up silver in the ladies 1,500 metre race. The speedskaters now have one gold (Christine Nesbitt in ladies' 1,000 metre) two silver (Groves and Marianne St-Gelais in the short track ladies' 500 metre) and a bronze (Groves in the ladies' 3,000 metre).

There are still events remaining. The ladies' 5,000 metre was on Feb. 24, and the team pursuit events are on Feb. 26 and 27.