Ben Tudhope wins first Winter Paralympics medal with bronze at Beijing 2022

Australian snowboarder Ben Tudhope has taken out the men’s snowboard cross SB-LL2 bronze medal at the Beijing 2022 Winter Paralympics.

The 22-year-old entered the event with the No.1 world ranking but faced a stiff challenge from Team Unicorn training partner Matti Suur-Hamari of Finland, who easily won gold in the event.

Tudhope got off to a rough start and was in last position midway through the race.

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However he fought back to snatch third place at the death, before celebrating wildly with his opponents.

The medal is Tudhope’s first across his three Winter Paralympic campaigns following his extraordinary debut at Sochi 2014 as a 14-year-old.

Tudhope and Suur-Hamari qualified for the final on Monday after facing a challenge from Japan’s Keiji Okamoto at the start of their semi-final.

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Okamoto rushed out to an early lead before the two favourites made their way to the front and put themselves in the mix for a medal.

But the other semi-final did not go to plan for Tudhope and Suur-Hamari’s Team Unicorn training partner Alex Massie.

The Canadian was comfortably on his way to qualifying for the final when an accident took out riders behind him, but Massie lost control on the soft snow and was forced into a revert.

He could only finish third as China’s Sun Qi and American Garrett Geros made their way through to the medal race.

Earlier, Tudhope had also finished second in his quarter-final following a tight battle with American Keith Gable, who got away early and couldn’t be reeled in.

Suur-Hamari and