That’s it from us for today.Lots happening tomorrow though: the qualifiers begin for the aerials, which is always spectacular, as will be the snowboard slopestyle final.There are medals in biathlon and in Nordic combined, for the fans of serrated skis.There’ll be team pursuit medals in the speed skating, the men’s big air final for skis, the short program for the women’s single figure skating, the two-man bobsleigh medals, and more curling than you can slide a rock at.See you there.

More Dutch speed skating success, with Xandra Velzeboer winning the women’s 1000m,Loic Meillard brought Swiss gold in the men’s slalomGreat Britain are in a tough spot in the men’s curling standings, fifth with only two games in hand,The USA and Canada go into the women’s hockey gold medal match, with Sweden and Switzerland to play off for bronze,Austria wins the men’s ski jump team gold based on second round points, with the final round cancelled for weather,USA goes gold and bronze in the women’s monobob, with Elana Meyers Taylor stunned to see Germany’s Laura Nolte give up the lead during the final run.

A bold big air final for the women’s skiers saw huge tricks landed, with Canada’s Megan Oldham on top, before Eileen Gu and Flora Tabenelli knocked Kirsty Muir off the podium with third-round stunners.Japan win pairs figure-skating gold thanks to Miura Riku and Kihara Riyuichi.The Swiss have narrowed the gap in the women’s ice hockey semi, it’s 2-1 to Canada with most of the third period to go.Can’t find a way through though, and they give up a powerplay to Canada with less than two minutes to go.The Swiss take their goalie off, bring on an extra attacker, but to no avail.

Sometimes you see figure skating comps where it’s routine after routine of perfect execution, and it’s compelling for that reason, even though there’s no way for the ordinary observer to see much difference between the performances.Today was different, with a series of minor mistakes, of the cracks where the pressure told, and then a couple of performances without any, including one under more pressure than most.Miura and Kihara are the current world championship holders from 2025, but had so much work to do.To produce what they did was a truly great performance.What a moment for Miura and Kihara.

They’re in tears, kneeling on the ground in gratitude, turned to face one another, and only after some 30 seconds of disbelief do they break out into smiles.One partner lifts up the other, only this time it’s in an embrace to celebrate winning a medal rather than an effort to do so.They were nowhere after the short program, the first round.They had finished fifth, seven points off the lead, having made a mistake that held them back.Winning from there is so, so difficult: having to put up a score for other teams to chase, dealing with judges who tend to score higher as the rounds go on.

Yet they came out and delivered a flawless, stunning skate, bravely and ambitiously and with technical precision, and then put up a truly massive score of 158.13 for their second round.Georgia win silver, that country’s first winter Games medal, thanks to Anastasiia Metelkina and Luka Berulava.Germany take bronze via Minerva Hase and Nikita Volodin.Dramatic strings for Minerva Hase and Nikita Volodin, more lively than many.

A lovely beginning, as they start kneeling beside one another with eyes closed, then rise into their routine.The synced jumps are good for the first, the second, then she slips out a touch on the third landing.Then can’t complete a triple salchow, goes for a single instead.So a couple of deductions coming.Lovely spiral in terms of form, but did it miss a rotation? They finish off well, it’s a very good routine, but how good? I’m thinking maybe silver, likely bronze, but can’t see how they’re going top…It’s 139.

08, which means it’s bronze for Germany! They slip from top spot but it’s still a fine finish.Fair play to the Georgians.Great speed across the ice, dynamism in their number despite some very slow mournful French music.I’m in the cart too for the sparkly aquamarine numbers that they’re wearing to match.Superb lifts, Luka Berulava is a rock at the base of those, and Anastasiia Metelkina’s shape at the top of the lifts is immaculate.

But she steps off the landing of one of their throws, so that will be a deduction, and there are a couple of other technical checks.The music shift for the second half of their program didn’t really gel with the first, for me, on the artistic front.146.29! Which means 221.75 overall, which means they are in silver position now, probably bronze after the final pair skate, and Georgia will win its first ever Winter Olympic medal.

Japan is guaranteed silver now, and could yet hang on for gold.Here comes the last pair, for Germany.Talk about Meatloaf and schmaltz, the Canadian pair are using the Gladiator theme music.My name ix Maximus Decimus Aurelius, father of a murdered triple axel attempt.Oh, and there is a stumble! First Lia Pereira, a small miss of her footing that she recovers, then a couple of moves later, a hand-down slip from Trennt Michaud.

Two reds there, and a yellow on their death spiral spin as they come out of it early.That’s a shame, they’ve been thrown off.They recover through a strong lift section, they’ve been brave, and they embrace each other with tenderness in their disappointment.They’ve had a very high finish in this comp, without getting everything right in their last run.They’ll be out of the medals…it’s 125.

06 for the round, and 199.66 in sixth spot overall right now.A personal best combined score for them, well done.It also means that Japan are on the podium for that wonder-skate.They can’t finish lower than third now.

Very strong technical skate from Maria Pavlova and Alexei Sviatchenko for Hungary,Green boxes across the screen, which means no complaints from the technical committee,I’m still going to say, I didn’t get as much sense of emotion or flair from this pair as some others, it was far from the most interesting routine to watch, even though nothing went wrong,The judges say…Not quite! Not enough for the lead,Still a great score, 131.

39 is a personal best, and they’re in second spot with three pairs to go.Basically the last four pairs of figure skaters need to score about 156, or in the case of the leading Germans, 152, to go past the Japanese score on combined points.That’s what we’re watching out for.Here’s Pawel Smrek writing in to clarify the ski jumping situation, thanks Pawel.“Due to heavy snow which significantly reduced descent speeds, the third round of jumps was cancelled and the points accrued after the second round determined the final standings.

There were 13 out of 16 possible jumps taken in the third round, however the jury thought that the conditions deteriorated so significantly that the final three jumpers would’ve been at an unfair disadvantage.”Beau Dure writes in.“Elana Meyers Taylor had a couple of world championships, a lot of World Cup successes and five Olympic medals, but until five minutes ago, she didn’t have Olympic gold.”The last four warming up in the skating: Hungary, Canada, Georgia, Germany.In the ice hockey semis, Canada’s women are leading Switzerland 2-0 in the second period.

Stunning skate from Japan! Miura Riku and Kihara Riyuichi are perfection.They had a stutter in the first round that saw them finish fifth coming into this round, where normally they would be expecting to be in the top couple, so they have a lot of ground to make up.Miura is tiny, so Kihara is able to throw her around with ease.He’s spinning her on top of his upstretched arm like she’s a pizza base.Their solo jump sequence is in sync, then she lands his throws with such assurance.

They pull out all the stops going into the closing sequence, a dizzying (literally) display of spins and lifts.They score a staggering 158.13.That’s nearly 23 points higher than the next best in this round.Overall they’re on 231, with their lower score from the first round.

They, like some others, sink to the ice with relief on realising how perfectly they’ve performed in that round.There are still four pairs to go, and normally you’d expect the medals to come from the last few, but that might have been a gold medal skate.Now we’re back to the figure skating pairs.China currently leading, Italy second, with five scores yet to come in.To recap the curling, the Swiss came back beat GB in the women’s team round robin match, Korea beat China, Canada beat Japan, and Italy got their first win over the USA.

That leaves Sweden unbeaten at the top of the group, then Korea, Switzerland, USA all on four wins.Three games to go, so in theory any of the ten teams could still qualify.Four hundredths of a second separate gold and silver, but it’s not in the order you’d expect.Meyers Taylor had the second-last run, but got home in 59.51.

Laura Nolte of Germany was last, and had to hold her lead, but a couple of tiny clips of the wall might have cost her.It was a very good run, 59.70 overall, but just enough to slip into silver position.She’s disappointed, while Meyers-Taylor leaps around the waiting area with her young son and her bronze-winning teammate, Kaillie Armbruster Humphries.Elana Meyers Taylor, at 41 years of age and after several years out of the sport to have kids, has come back to win gold.

Meg Oldham falls, looking for the switch left double 14 mute grab, a monster trick attempt on her last run, but it does not matter.She’s last to jump, she’s already in top spot, and Megan Oldham wins gold for Canada.Eileen Gu runs out to embrace her, the Chinese skier looking absolutely delighted with a silver medal.She was ice cold on her third jump to get into that second spot from absolutely nowhere.And Flora Tabanelli the home slope medallist, bronze for Italy with a similarly nerveless jump for 94.

25, the highest score of the whole night, on her final jump.A long chat with her coach at the top of the slope for Muir, deciding what to try.She needs to improve her score.Snow falling across her goggles.She closes her eyes and takes a beat.

Forward facing, looking for the double 14 tailgrab… and she skids out on the landing! Just hit the snow so hard and those skis slip out.She’s a dejected figure as she picks herself up and walks off the course, having occupied the gold medal spot for a brief moment.Kirsty Muir will have to go big for a medal.There’s a 1680 rotation for Flora Tabenelli, four and a half rotations for the Italian, lands the jump switch, scores a 94, and it boosts her from fourth to third.Now we’re getting hot.

Multiple skiers landing 16s tonight,Goodness me,Heavy landing for Maria Gaslitter, she loses her rotation and lands on her shoulder and back, but thankfully bounces right back up and is smiling by the time she reaches the bottom of the run,Tried to go big to improve, and couldn’t make it happen,Anni Karava similarly loses her landing and won’t improve for Finland in the ski big air