Lindsey Vonn lived up to her reputation as the best downhill skier in the world by claiming the women's Olympic title on Wednesday as Shaun White and Shani Davis made it a golden day to remember for the United States. But with the Games in day six, more bad news greeted under-pressure Vancouver organisers after 19 people were injured when a barricade near the stage collapsed at a venue offering free concerts during the Olympics.
All were treated on site with nine then taken to hospital, mostly for minor injuries. It added to a growing list of problems plaguing the Games, which have been blighted by weather woes that have forced delays to key events and the cancellation of thousands of tickets due to safety issues. It also emerged Wednesday that a mentally ill man, carrying a home-made security pass, got within metres of US Vice-President Joe Biden at the opening ceremony last Friday in a major security breach.
Vonn delivered organisers some relief with a sizzling performance on the piste at Whistler, winning the United States' first ever Olympic gold in a thrilling downhill marred by a series of spectacular crashes. It was flawless performance in perfect conditions on Franz's Run, with the shin injury she had complained about not an issue as she crossed the line in 1min 44.19sec.
Team-mate Julia Mancuso came second at 0.56sec for a surprise silver while Austrian Elisabeth Goergl captured bronze. The flame-headed White, meanwhile, cemented his position as a snowboarding superstar with the Winter Olympics' top-earning athlete defending his halfpipe title ahead of Finland's Peetu Piiroinen and Scott Lago of the United States.
He scored 48.4 in his second run after 46.8 in his first, which was enough to seal victory. Davis became the first man to win back-to-back 1,000-metre speedskating titles. South Korea's Mo Tae-Bum was second and fellow American Chad Hedrick third."
At Richmond Oval, China's dominant Wang Meng blitzed the field to retain her 500m short-track speed skating title, leaving Canada's Marianne St-Gelais and Italy's Arianna Fontana to pick up the minor medals. Russia's Nikita Kriukov also claimed gold when he held off compatriot Alexander Panzhinskiy in a photo-finish to win the men's sprint classic.
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