ST. MORITZ, Switzerland (AP) — Italian snowboarder Michela Moioli finally earned an elusive world championship gold medal despite finishing the race on her back on Friday.
Moioli and Charlotte Bankes fell at the line in a photo finish to the snowboard cross event. A replay showed Maioli’s board crossed a few inches ahead of her British rival’s as they slid over the line on their backs.
Moioli lay flat back on the snow and appeared to be sobbing as she was warmly embraced by Bankes, the 2021 world champion.
“I made it. I can’t really believe it that I’m a world champion, it sounds weird to me still,” Moioli said with a laugh.
Julia Pereira de Sousa of France was third.
Moioli, who won Olympic gold in the snowboard cross in 2018, had never triumphed at the freestyle skiing and snowboard world championships in four previous attempts.
She won bronze in 2015, 2017 and 2019 and silver in 2021. Moioli, who also had two silver medals from team events, missed the last world championships through injury.
Éliot Grondin of Canada also won a first world title in the men’s event.
Defending champion Jakob Dusek and Austrian compatriot Alessandro Hämmerle — the Olympic champion — were working together for one of them to take the victory but they came into contact on the final bend, allowing Grondin to sneak through for the win.
Loan Bozzolo of France was second, with Hämmerle third.
Grondin won bronze at the worlds in 2021 and secured silver in the 2022 Olympic Games, when he also took home bronze in the team event.
Ryoma Kimata and Kokomo Murase achieved a Japan men’s and women’s snowboard big air double triumph.
Japan won five of the six medals.
Murase became the first Japanese woman to win the big air gold and led a 1-2-3 sweep along with Reira Iwabuchi and Mari Fukada. Another teammate, Momo Suzuki, was fourth.
Kimata overcame compatriot and 2023 champion Taiga Hasegawa with his third and last run — nose still bleeding from a heavy fall in his second run — to win his first major title.
The 16-year-old Oliver Martin of the U.S. was third, adding to his slopestyle bronze from a week ago.
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The Associated Press
