Milan Cortina, Brignone fairytale gold in the Super-G at the Olympics amidst tears

Brignone: “Something incredible”

“It’s something incredible, I thought about skiing and doing my best, I said ‘make or break, but I didn’t think I could win gold, honestly. I wouldn’t have expected it, never in my life, it’s really something special.” These are the words of the Italian champion Federica Brignone at the Rai after the Superg at the Games Milan Cortina. “Maybe I did it today because I didn’t miss it, I knew I had done my best, it was my strength, I considered myself an outsider, today is truly something special.”

Goggia: “Honor to Federica Brignone”

“I would like to congratulate Federica Brignonewith all the months that have passed after the injury, the recovery, it’s not easy to come back from an injury and get like this. He always felt this SuperG in the world cup. Honor and credit to her“. These are the words of Sofia Goggia to Rai after leaving the scene in Women’s Super-G at the Milan Cortina Olympicswith which he gives credit to his teammate Federica Brignone, currently leading the race”.

The feat after the injury

Winner of the last World Cup and protagonist of a record recovery after the terrible injury last April 3 at the Italian championships, with the multi-fragmentary displaced fracture of the tibial plateau and the head of the fibula of the left leg and the rupture of the anterior cruciate ligament, the La Salle Tiger, registered with the Carabinieri Sports Centre, manages to win her fourth Olympic medal, the first gold, after the bronze in 2018, the silver in 2022 in giant slalom and silver in combined again in 2022.

At almost 36 years old, the Valle d’Aosta champion thus rightfully enters, if there were still any need, into the Olympus of world skiing, materializing that dream that seemed compromised on the snows of Alpe Lusia. On an overcast day and on an Olympia delle Tofane that is less rough than the descent, the blue champion manages to find the perfect lines and the best speed to place a winning lead ahead of the Frenchwoman Romane Mirandoli, and the Austrian Cornelia Hütter who beat her compatriot Ariane Rädler to the bronze by just one hundredth.

Fifth Laura Pirovano who gives up 0″76 to her teammate and can complain about an error in the upper part of the track which separated her from the podium; the girl from Rende is tied with the Norwegian Kajsa Lie in the final ranking, with a margin of just one hundredth Elena Curtoni, seventh at 0″77. The girl from Valtellina also faced Olympia delle Tofane well, missing the podium by just over two tenths. The Italians were the absolute protagonists, as was Sofia Goggia, who performed an unapproachable first part of the race, before running into line errors that took her off a course that betrayed several favourites, from Aicher to Ledecka.

Italy returns to the Olympic Super-G throne 24 years after the title won by Daniela Ceccarelli in Salt Lake City 2002, while the last absolute five-ring gold was that of Sofia Goggia in the PyeongChang 2018 downhill.