© Fabrice Coffrini
French skier Clement Noel finishes the second heat of the slalom at the Beijing Winter Olympics on February 16, 2022 in Yanqing.
Frenchman Clément Noël became the 24-year-old Olympic slalom champion this Wednesday in Yanqing, bringing his country the fourth gold medal at the Beijing-2022 Winter Games.
The Austrian Johannes Strolz won the silver medal and the Norwegian Sebastian Foss-Solevaag took the bronze.
The Frenchman was one of the contenders for the title in a specialty without a true skipper this year, as the six World Cup slaloms contested this season had six different winners, one of them Noël.
“I knew I was fit. My races in January have not been good, but I felt very fast in training. Olympic champion! I have no words… It’s the culmination,” said the Frenchman.
Noël is the first French Olympic champion in alpine skiing since Antoine Deneriaz, who won the downhill in 2006.
Sixth in the first round, the Frenchman made a perfect second, the best among the competitors, which allowed him to win gold.
The Austrian Strolz, leader following the first round, only had the thirteenth fastest time in the second, finishing at the end 61 hundredths behind the Frenchman, in second position.
The Norwegians Sebastian Foss-Solevaag and Henrik Kristoffersen, third and second in the initial heat, did the same as Strolz, a mediocre second, with 15th and 18th records, respectively, finishing in third and fourth places, 70 and 79 hundredths behind. French.
Noël achieved his first medal in a major international event following having won nine slalom events in World Cups.
At the Pyeongchang-2018 Games, he had ranked fourth in slalom, being seventh in the 2019 World Cup and twenty-first in 2021.
– Flaherty finishes once more –
With his triumph in Beijing, he became the fifth French Olympic slalom champion, succeeding Jean-Pierre Vidal (2002), Jean-Claude Killy (1968) and the sisters Christine (1964) and Marielle Goitschel (1968).
Strolz, for his part, achieved his second medal in Beijing, following his gold in the combined.
Among the four participants from the Latin American delegations, only Puerto Rican William Flaherty finished, finishing in 44th place, the penultimate of the 45 who reached the finish line, 28 seconds and 34 hundredths behind the winner.
Almost half of the participants did not finish, among them the Argentine Tomás Birkner, the Colombian Michael Poettoz, eliminated in the first round, and the Brazilian Michel Macedo, who did not finish the second.
The young representative of the Caribbean country, Flaherty, fulfilled his dream by finishing the two tests in which he participated.
The Puerto Rican born in Cincinatti was diagnosed with a rare cancer when he was three years old and was saved by his brother Charles, also an Olympian in Pyeongchang-2028, who donated his bone marrow.
At 17 years old, he has managed to finish the two tests in which he has participated, finishing on Sunday in 40th place in the giant.
The young Puerto Rican, following a lifetime of operations, will undergo two new surgeries following the Games, on his jaw and fibula, which will put an end to his short career as a skier.
“I kept fighting and going forward to fulfill my Olympic dream and I did it. Everything is achieved with determination. You have to keep going, no matter what you find, and you can fulfill your dreams,” William Flaherty told AFP on Sunday.
bur-psr / d
