Sawt Falasteen - Comeback queen Brignone stars, Ukrainian banned over helmet

Brignone, at 35, became the oldest ever Olympic gold medal winner in alpine skiing, surpassing Norway's Aksel Lund Svindal by a few months. The Italian also surpassed Lindsey Vonn, who is coached by Svindal, as the oldest female medallist.

It was a remarkable results for Brignone, coming less than a year after she suffered a double leg fracture in April 2025.

"Being at home, a home Olympics, and bringing the flag, representing my country, after all I've been through, it's something so special," said Brignone, who saw a raft of rivals fail to finish a tricky course in Cortina d'Ampezzo.

"It has been hard. For so long, I couldn't walk, and I couldn't put pressure on my leg. I was telling myself, 'how can I ski at more than 100 kilometres an hour?'.

"But every day, I was telling myself, 'tomorrow, it will be much better'."

- Helmet woe -

Brignone's achievement followed a spectacular end to the stand-off between the Interational Olympic Committee and Ukrainian skeleton racer Vladyslav Heraskevych.

The IOC banned Heraskevych from the Winter Olympics for refusing to ditch a helmet carrying pictures of Ukrainian sportsmen and women killed since Russian forces invaded Ukraine in 2022, arguing that he had failed "to adhere to the IOC athlete expression guidelines".

Gestures of a political nature during competition are forbidden under the Olympic charter. Athletes are permitted, however, to express their views in press conferences and on social media.

"This is (the) price of our dignity," Heraskevych reacted on X alongside a picture of his helmet.

The IOC had said it would "make an exception" for Heraskevych, allowing him to wear a plain black armband during competition.

IOC chief Kirsty Coventry even met with Ukraine's flag bearer early on Thursday in a last-ditch attempt to persuade him to change his mind about the helmet before his competition started.

But it was to no avail and the athlete was disqualified, a move Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said played "into the hands of aggressors".

- Kim aims for gold -

In competition later Thursday, US superstar Chloe Kim begins her quest for her own piece of history as she tries to become the first snowboarder -- man or woman -- to win three gold medals at consecutive Olympics.

Two athletes have missed the chance to do so earlier in the Games in Italy, but in her first appearance at these Games Kim produced a sparkling run to top qualifying for the halfpipe event.

Australian freestyle skier Cooper Woods earlier won Olympic men's moguls gold in dramatic fashion, with a tiebreak needed to separate him from Canadian great Mikael Kingsbury.

The athletes both scored 83.71 in their final runs in Livigno, meaning the marks they achieved for their turns came into play.

Woods' mark of 48.40 was marginally better than Kingsbury's 47.70, giving the 25-year-old a first Olympic medal.

"I didn't have any expectations this morning," said Cooper. "I just wanted to go out and ski my runs and stay true to what I know I can achieve."

Despite the pain of missing out on gold, Kingsbury became the first athlete to win medals in the same freestyle skiing event at four straight Olympics.

In addition to his gold in 2018, he won silver at the 2014 Sochi Games and again eight years later in Beijing.

Kingsbury said it felt "amazing" to win a fourth Olympic medal.

"I'm very happy with my skiing," he said. "It was close, a tiebreak –- unfortunately I'm the guy not on the good side of it. But I've worked very hard for this medal."

After Brignone's success on the slope, there was a second triumph of the day for Italy thanks to speed skater Francesca Lollobrigida.

Lollobrigida won the women's 5,000m gold just five days after smashing the Olympic record to also win the 3,000m.

T.Ibrahim--SF-PST