New Zealand have had a corker of an Olympics in PyeongChang. After a 26 year medal drought, the tiny nation across the ditch picked up two bronze medals in one day, today with Zoi Sadowski Synnett winning in women’s Big Air and Nico Porteous in ski halfpipe.
This puts their medal tally at 2 bronze from an athlete pool of 21. Team Australia (51 athletes) has, thus far, won 2 well deserved silvers and 1 super cool bronze with only three days remaining to score any more.
Our biggest remaining medal hope is Sami Kennedy Sim in Skier Cross. She qualified 9th today for tomorrow’s finals. The same day that Kiwi snowboarder, 20 year old Carlos Garcia Knight, competes in Big Air where he finished first in yesterday’s qualifications. A gold for Carlos, added to the two bronze, would surely surpass two silver and abronze for Australia. Not that we’re competitive, or counting.
The world loves an underdog. Shaun White said at the games this year, he’d love to be one but knows he can’t ever be. Nor can he be a quiet achiever, which is what we’re calling the Kiwi team for 2018 who have snuck in from behind while the rest of us were obsessing about James versus White, Chumpy versus Hughes and an Australian Olympic swimmer who tried to pull focus from our Winter Olympians.
Four years ago the New Zealand Winter Olympic Team were accused of being on a giant New Zealand tax payer holiday by NZ Herald writer, Dana Johannsen, who certainly can’t claim the same this Olympics.
The gripe of Johannsen’s article back then focused on freestyle skiing and snowboarding and new disciplines ski and snowboard slopestyle where athletes risk their lives on huge jumps that take years of training and courage to master. Yet it is here, in the freestyle skiing and snowboarding disciplines that New Zealand have excelled this games with one medal in halfpipe ski and one in big air snowboarding. Thus far.
Three out of four New Zealand halfpipe skiers qualified for finals (that’s a quarter of the 12 man field) and while 16 year old Porteous stood on the third place podium, his team mate Beau James Wells finished fourth. Garcia Knight who is a medal contender tomorrow in Big Air, also finished fifth in snowboard Slopestyle, crashing on his third run while in bronze contention. Not bad for a first time Olympian. These are all great results for our Australasian cousins.
One thing the Kiwis have that Australia doesn’t is an Olympic sized 22 foot Super pipe, the same super pipe that Scotty James has to use for training in the pre northern season, because Australia doesn’t have one. Despite Shaun White building one at Perisher for pre Sochi training and Perisher’s plans, that has for the moment been environmentally thwarted, to build one themselves.
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James revealed his desire for a pipe in his home country while competing in PyeongChang this month.
