The men's downhill competition of the PyeongChang 2018 Olympics was held on Thursday, 15 February, at the Jeongseon Alpine Centre in PyeongChang.[1][2] Scheduled for Sunday, 11 February, winds in excess of 50 km/h (31 mph) forced officials to postpone the race four days.[3]
| Men's downhill at the XXIII Olympic Winter Games | |||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
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| Venue | Jeongseon Alpine Centre, Gangwon Province, South Korea | ||||||||||||
| Date | 15 February | ||||||||||||
| Competitors | 55 from 26 nations | ||||||||||||
| Winning time | 1:40.25 | ||||||||||||
| Medalists | |||||||||||||
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| Men's Downhill | |
|---|---|
| Location | Jeongseon Alpine Centre |
| Vertical | 825 m (2,707 ft) |
| Top elevation | 1,370 m (4,495 ft) |
| Base elevation | 545 m (1,788 ft) |
Summary
editThe defending champion was Matthias Mayer. Other competitors included the 2014 silver medalist Christof Innerhofer, the bronze medalist Kjetil Jansrud, as well as the 2010 silver medalist Aksel Lund Svindal. Through 2018, the Olympic men's downhill has yet to have a repeat champion.
Aksel Lund Svindal won the gold medal, with a slight advantage over Kjetil Jansrud (silver) and Beat Feuz (bronze), who gained his first Olympic medal.
The race course was 2.965 km (1.84 mi) in length, with a vertical drop of 825 m (2,707 ft) from a starting elevation of 1,370 m (4,495 ft) above sea level. Svindal had an average speed of 106.474 km/h (66.16 mph) and an average vertical descent rate of 8.229 m/s (27.00 ft/s).
Qualification
editA total of up to 320 alpine skiers qualified across all eleven events. Athletes qualified for this event by having met the A qualification standard only, which meant having 80 or less FIS Points and being ranked in the top 500 in the Olympic FIS points list. The Points list takes into average the best results of athletes per discipline during the qualification period (July 1, 2016 to January 21, 2018). Countries received additional quotas by having athletes ranked in the top 30 of the current World Cup season (two per gender maximum, overall across all events). After the distribution of B standard quotas (to nations competing only in the slalom and giant slalom events), the remaining quotas were distributed using the Olympic FIS Points list, with each athlete only counting once for qualification purposes. A country could only enter a maximum of four athletes for the event.[4]
Results
editThe race was started at 11:30 local time, (UTC+9). At the starting gate, the skies were clear, the temperature was −3.8 °C (25 °F), and the snow condition was hard.[5]
References
edit- ^ "Venues". www.pyeongchang2018.com/. Pyeongchang 2018 Olympic Organizing Committee for the 2018 Winter Olympics. Archived from the original on 17 February 2018. Retrieved 26 December 2017.
- ^ Start list
- ^ "Winter Olympics men's downhill postponed due to high winds". TheGuardian.com. 11 February 2018.
- ^ "Qualification Systems for XXII Olympic Winter Games, PyeongChang 2018 Alpine skiing" (PDF). International Ski Federation (FIS). 16 August 2017. Retrieved 20 January 2018.
- ^ "Men's downhill results" (PDF). 14 February 2018. Retrieved 14 February 2018.