CORTINA D’AMPEZZO, Italy — This time, Janine Flock completed the job. And a gold medal lastly sways from her neck.

Flock — the Austrian slider who got here into these Milan Cortina Video games winless in 16 all-time appearances at both the Olympics or the world championships — bought, by far, the largest win of her lengthy and legendary profession on Saturday night time.

She’s the ladies’s skeleton Olympic champion, finishing 4 runs in 3 minutes, 49.02 seconds and ending off a wire-to-wire victory. The 36-year-old bought her first Olympic medal in 4 makes an attempt, holding off Germany’s Susanne Kreher and Jacqueline Pfeifer for the win.

Flock was handed an Austrian flag shortly after hopping off the sled. She hoisted the flag into the air, then clapped her arms because the emotion started lastly pouring out.

It was a win about 20 years within the making. Flock is a three-time World Cup total champion with 15 World Cup race wins, 45 World Cup medals total, and has silver and bronze medals from the world championships.

And now, gold within the largest race of all. Flock was fourth on the 2018 Olympics, ninth in 2014 and tenth in 2022. All that was forgotten on Saturday night time.

Kreher was second in 3:49.32. And Pfeifer — the silver medalist at Pyeongchang in 2018 and now the second girl to win two Olympic skeleton medals, becoming a member of two-time gold medalist Lizzy Yarnold of Britain — was third in 3:49.46.

Kelly Curtis of the U.S., who lives in Italy as a part of her responsibility with the U.S. army, was twelfth in 3:52.13. Mystique Ro was fifteenth for the Individuals in 3:52.48.

Flock’s lead getting into Saturday’s last two runs was a mere 0.04 seconds over Kreher. That meant Flock went first within the third warmth, setting the tone for what was about to occur.

Kreher went subsequent and was forward of Flock’s time for about half of her third run, earlier than beginning to bleed time. Kreher led by about two-tenths of a second at one level, then wasted all that and extra — ending the warmth 0.21 seconds behind Flock.

That does not sound like a lot. It’s in sliding.

The one time in Olympic historical past the place somebody wasted a lead with one run to go within the girls’s skeleton occasion was 2018 — when Flock led the sphere, solely to throw down a clunker within the last run. She went from first to fourth that day in that last warmth, not solely lacking gold however lacking the medals totally.

Her lead with one run to go in 2018: 0.02 seconds.

The lead on Saturday night time with one warmth left was greater than 10 instances greater. That is one sizable cushion. Flock is not a terrific starter, so all of her lead — after which some — going into the ultimate run was given away on the prime of the monitor. That wasn’t a shock.

However she is a superb driver. This time, she was a terrific finisher, too.

She stored discovering velocity, regaining the highest spot with just some curves to go. The ultimate margin was three-tenths of a second, just because no one within the area knew find out how to get down the monitor any higher than Flock did.

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AP Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/milan-cortina-2026-winter-olympics