Mario Matt became the oldest Olympic skiing champion on Saturday when he won a chaotic men’s slalom while the penultimate day of the Sochi Games saw a fourth positive dope test.
The 34-year-old Matt, a two-time slalom world champion, proved unbeatable over the two runs, finishing with a combined time of 1min 41.84sec to close the skiing competition.
His Austrian compatriot Marcel Hirscher, the reigning world champion, finished second at 0.28sec, with young Norwegian sensation Henrik Kristoffersen taking bronze at 0.83sec.
While Matt beat Norwegian legend Kjetil Andre Aamodt for the mantle of oldest winner, 19-year-old Kristoffersen became the youngest Olympic medallist in men’s alpine skiing.
“You can tell yourself this is just a training run but when it works out like this it is incredible,” said Matt, who won his first world championship gold in 2001.
A legion of favourites failed to finish the second run including Felix Neureuther, Alexis Pinturault and newly crowned giant slalom champion Ted Ligety.
“(It’s) borderline unsportsmanlike to set those kinds of courses on these kinds of hills,” complained Ligety.
Away from the slopes, the Olympics were hit by two more doping cases.
Ukrainian cross country skier Marina Lisogor tested positive for the banned substance trimetazidine.
The Ukrainian Olympic Committee said Lisogor, 30, told a disciplinary hearing that she had unwittingly consumed the substance in a medicine.
“I ask forgiveness from those who will see this and be disappointed or upset. But there was no intent or desire to take a banned substance,” she said.
Later Saturday, the International Olympic Committee said that Latvian ice hockey player Vitalijs Pavlovs had been kicked out of the Games for testing positive for the banned substance methylhexaneamine.
The cases came a day after news of failed tests for German biathlete Evi Sachenbacher-Stehle and Italian bobsleigh athlete William Frullani.
The last day on Sunday will determine who tops the medals table. Hosts Russia are on top of the medals table with 11 golds and 29 medals, with Norway also on 11 gold with a total of 26.
Saturday was also a day of protests with the Korean Skating Union asking the International Skating Union to review the judging that saw women’s figure skate gold go to Russia’s Adelina Sotnikova rather than Kim Yu-Na.
France’s podium sweep in the freestyle ski cross was also in jeopardy after Canada and Slovenia protested to the Court of Arbitration for Sport that the winners had altered the aerodynamic features of the competitors’ trousers.
– Bjoergen equals medals record –
Norwegian cross country skier Marit Bjoergen won the women’s 30km mass start, taking her sixth Olympic gold to become the most successful woman in Olympic Winter Games history.
In a clean sweep for Norway, Bjoergen showed her usual supremacy in the sprint finish, coming home ahead of Therese Johaug and Kristin Stoermer Steira.
Bjoergen has now equalled the record of Soviet speed skater Lidia Skoblikova and Russian cross country skier Lyubov Yegorova in taking six golds at Winter Olympics.
She has also equalled the record of 10 medals overall held by cross country skiers Stefania Belmondo of Italy and Raisa Smetanina of the USSR.
Her compatriot, Ole Einar Bjoerndalen, missed out on a chance for a historic ninth gold medal in the men’s 4×7.5km relay.
Four teams were neck-and-neck on the final leg but Norway’s anchorman Emil Hegle Svendsen endured a disastrous final standing shoot that put his team out of the running.
Russian home favourite Anton Shipulin secured the gold by sprinting clear of Germany’s Simon Schempp in the home straight, finishing in 1 hour 12min 15.9sec with Germany 3.5 sec behind. Austria took the bronze.
Bjoerndalen set a record at these Games by winning a total of 13 medals at Winter Olympics but remains equal with Norwegian cross country skier Bjoern Daehlie on the most golds at eight.
Russia’s American-born snowboarder Vic Wild claimed his second gold in Sochi as he stormed to parallel slalom victory while Austria’s Julia Dujmovits took the women’s title.
The Dutch speed skaters won both the men’s and women’s team pursuit titles in a fitting end to a dominant showing in Sochi.
The Netherlands won 23 of the 36 medals on offer, bagging eight of the 12 golds.
In men’s ice hockey, Teemu Selanne scored twice as Finland crushed the USA 5-0 to claim the bronze medal.