Aigner bags fourth gold as Voronchikhina and Zhang win Paralympic Slalom titles

Veronika Aigner (AUT) secured her fourth gold of these Milano Cortina Paralympic Winter Games with an emphatic victory in the Women’s Slalom Vision Impaired.

She did well to keep up with guide Eric Digruber on the first run, and her reward was a lead in excess of one and a half seconds over teammate Elina Stary (guide Stefan Winter). She was even better on the second run, going 2.4 seconds faster than Stary for a successful Slalom title defence by 4.04 seconds on the Olimpia Delle Tofane.

After two bronze medals, 19-year-old Stary achieved her best finish on Paralympic debut with Alexandrova Rexova (SVK; Matus Duris) matching her bronze from Beijing as she claimed a third medal of the Games. Chiara Mazzel (ITA; Fabrizio Casal) failed to add to her tally of one gold and three silver medals from these Games as she straddled a gate just after the midway point of the first run.

At 23, Aigner now has six Paralympic golds and only Mazzel in the Super-G denied her a clean sweep of titles in Cortina. All that despite losing her usual guide, sister Elisabeth, to a knee injury in the build-up to the Games. She won two golds with Lilly Sammer, and two with Digruber who was formerly head coach of the Austrian Para Alpine team.

“It’s very special,” said Aigner. “Lilly’s only 16 but she’s very crazy, more than me and this is very good. She had her first Downhill races ever and she was very nervous but it’s OK when you try your first Downhill. And I’m very proud of Eric. He has very fast skis and I like that. He’s a good skier.”

“With Lilly I had a few weeks training and it was very good. Eric has known me for years. He’s a big brother for me and we made the perfect team.”

“It’s pretty special,” added Digruber. “We talked in years past when I stopped being the head coach about still supporting them if they need me as a spare guide. It doesn’t matter if it’s a World Cup or a FIS race or now the Paralympics, I try to shuffle everything around so that I’m here when they need me. And this time it was the Paralympics and I’m happy to be here.”

Voronchikhina profits from Årsjö calamity

There was high drama in the Slalom Standing as Varvara Voronchikhina won her second title in Cortina. Ebba Årsjö (SWE) should have followed Aigner in winning her fourth gold of the Games after taking a lead of one and three-quarter seconds over the Russian into the second run.

Despite that healthy advantage, the defending champion went out hard and her lead was over well three seconds at the first time split before she ran wide on a turn and had to almost stop to stay on track. The 25-year-old regained her momentum, but then straddled four gates from home to hand Voronchikhina victory.

Wenjing Zhu (CHN) took silver to add to her Combined bronze with Michaela Gosselin (CAN), who thought she was going to finish fourth just as she had in Beijing, finishing third for her first Paralympic medal.

Bowing out after her sixth Games was Sochi 2014 Slalom gold medalist Andrea Rothfuss. The German was eighth this time as she failed to add to her tally of 14 Paralympic medals in Cortina. But she enjoyed her final Games, wearing a glove with the words “Thank you” written on it in several languages, having made her debut aged 16 at Torino 2006.

"Today was an amazing race," said Voronchikhina. "I know in Slalom, Ebba is really hard to beat.

After the first run, I was in second and thought I would just enjoy it. But it's Slalom and things happen. I don't know what to say, because I really don't understand what happened. It was a surprise to me.

"The second run was hard today. Before the run there was rain and it was hard conditions. When Ebba had some problems on the race, I saw it. Slalom is really hard."

Gosselin was delighted at her first Paralympic medal after a number of near-misses. "It's been a challenging Games, but I think that all is in the past now, and I'm so happy to have a medal," she said. "It really means everything to me. I don't think it's sunk in yet.

"I was quite disappointed when I crossed the finish line. It felt like déjà vu from Beijing, coming fourth, and it's tough. That's not a position you want to be in, but it ended up being OK.

"This medal is testament to everything I've gone through. Ski racing is such a sport with ups and downs.

"Today I'm riding a high, but it took a lot of lows to get here. I'm very happy with this result in my skiing. To leave my second Paralympics with my first medal, it's just something nice to bring home."

Zhang claims Slalom Standing title

Wenjing Zhang (CHN) went one better than Beijing to take Slalom Sitting gold and clinch her first Paralympic title. The 23-year-old trailed Audrey Pascual Seco (ESP) by just a hundredth of a second after the first run, and put down a strong second run to put pressure on the double gold medalist.

Pascual, who had to go to hospital after a heavy crash in Friday’s Giant Slalom, was not as sharp on her second run, and slipped to third behind Nette Kiviranta (FIN) who claimed her first Paralympic medal. Two-time defending champion Anna-Lena Forster (GER) paid the price for a lackluster first run and, despite going quickest on the second, finished 0.43 off the pace in fourth.

"This is really special and shows the passion I have for this sport," said 24-year-old Kiviranta who suffered lower limb paralysis after a car accident in April 2018. "I've been training hard, the past month especially. This was my goal, today especially, and sums up the hard work we've been doing as a family.

"We have always made all the plans around Alpine Skiing, and I'm so honored I got the chance to continue. Being here today with my family, with my dad at the start, continuing skiing, and skiing at the top level... that's something you can't even maybe dream about, especially when you get injured.

"I've been really happy in these Games. I haven't been too nervous because I've been doing great in training. I was really happy after the first run because I didn't have to push extra. I did my thing and was surprised at the result. Then I knew I could maybe push a little extra, but just do the thing I did on first run and see the result."

That was the last race of the Women's Para Alpine program in Cortina. Aigner will be cheering on brother Johannes who could match her four-gold Games haul in the Men's Slalom on Sunday.