Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics daily briefing: speedy skating and White’s farewell

Today in a nutshell: We said farewell to Shaun White, Lara Gut-Behrami finally got a medal, Nils van der Poel smashed a world record and Irene Schouten is hopefully having a nice rest after destroying the field in the speed skating late yesterday

Next up: There’s more curling and ice hockey today, and then tomorrow we can anticipate the US v Canada in the men’s ice hockey

After his final Olympics appearance retiring snowboarding legend Shaun White said of the younger generation: “I don’t want to beat these guys anymore. I want to sponsor them.” White first won Olympic gold when aged 19 in 2006. This year’s gold went to Japan’s Ayumu Hirano. Australia’s Scotty James took silver, while Switzerland’s Jan Scherrer took the bronze.

“I just tried to ski today, nothing more, nothing less,” Switzerland’s Lara Gut-Behrami said when asked if her previous near misses had played on her mind. “Sometimes that’s the problem: we just try to think too much and try to do something different at the Olympics.” The 30-year-old won gold today in the women’s super-G after two consecutive agonising fourth-placed finishes at previous Games. Her compatriot Michelle Gisin took bronze, Austria’s Mirjam Puchner was second, 0.22 seconds behind Gut-Behrami. Mikaela Shiffrin finished ninth after failing to finish in either of her two previous races in Beijing.

On the endurance side of things, Finland’s Iivo Niskanen dominated the men’s 15km classic cross country. He finished just over 23 seconds ahead of Alexander Bolshunov of the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC). Marte Olsbu Roeiseland won gold for Norway in the women’s 7.5km biathlon.

The future of 15-year-old Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva remains in limbo despite the Independent Testing Agency