Winter Olympics LIVE: Charlotte Bankes suffers snowboard cross exit as Russia involved in doping claim

LIVE – Updated at 07:34

Day five of the Winter Olympics is well underway, on what could be a significant day for Team GB. Charlotte Bankes, the current world champion in snowboard cross, is a big medal hope for Great Britain and the current World Cup points leader. If she can secure gold it would be Britain’s 12th Winter Olympic title, and the country’s first ever on snow. Britain is still yet to win a first medal of any kind in China.

The USA will hope to end its longest-ever wait for its first gold medal of a Winter Olympics, having come up short in 31 events so far in Beijing, but there was more disappointment for medal favourite Mikaela Shiffrin, who had hoped to bounce back from a poor showing in the giant slalom earlier this week. She lost control about five seconds into her opening run of the slalom — and that was it for her in the event.

Meanwhile, American snowboard stars Shaun White and Chloe Kim begin the defence of their Olympic halfpipe titles and will go through qualifying for the 12-person finals. Kim is a strong gold-medal favourite, while White has said this is the last competition of his legendary career. He has medalled only once since making a 2018 comeback from a three year competitive break.

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What a crazy, crazy race. A lot of the heats so far had yet to capture the drama of snowboard cross, but that was absolutely wild. Bankes looked to be in a good position at the mid-way point, but Critchlow came from nowhere with a superb line up the inside, and Bankes was rather crowded out as Brockhoff took the outside line.

It all came down to the final jump and Critchlow and Brockhoff held on to cross the line and leave Bankes, the favourite and world champion, out.

Bankes is