Corey Peters wins first medal for New Zealand at the Pyeongchang 2018 Paralympic Winter Games
The sit skier finished the Men’s Downhill Sitting competition in a time of 1:26.01, 1.9s behind gold medallist, Andrew Kurka of the USA and 1.64s behind silver medallist, Taika Morii of Japan.
The tough course saw 6 DNFs amongst 26 competitors.
The New Zealand flag bearer from last night’s Opening Ceremony delivered a stupendous run sixth out of the gates, which saw him initially sitting in silver, before dropping into the bronze position a few runs on. Thus, began a nervous wait for Peters, as he sat in the winner’s box as another 18 competitors took to the slopes, aiming to knock him out of his third place spot. Tension ratcheted up to its highest when the Polish competitor, Igor Sikorski, set faster sector times through the top of the run, but a heavy slide put him out of contention and Peters only had another 2 competitors to wait out.
Peters bronze medal is the latest in his medal cabinet, after a silver medal in Sochi 2014 in his favoured Men’s Giant Slalom, which Peters has yet to contest at these Games.
The result came hard on the heels of a fantastic 5th place from veteran Para skier Adam Hall, who beat out a very strong field of 29 competitors in the Men’s Downhill Standing. Initially sitting in the bronze medal position, Hall slowly slipped down but showed very good signs of things yet to come.
