Five days after the tears fell, Kirsty Muir flew high over Livigno on the first stage of her redemption mission. By qualifying fourth for Monday’s Big Air final, it would seem that disappointment from her near-miss in the slopestyle has sufficiently abated.
There were questions about her readiness for this second crack at an Olympic medal, having appeared so devastated in the wake of missing a bronze by the tiniest of margins last Monday.
But the 21-year-old Scot, who won an X Games silver in Big Air just last month, has evidently returned in competitive form for what is considered her stronger discipline. Her best two scores of 87.5 and 79 were bettered only by the aggregates of Canada’s Megan Oldham, defending champion Eileen Gu of China and Switzerland Mathilde Gremaud, who won slopestyle gold.
Remarkably, it was the first time Gu has contested the Big Air since her gold at Beijing 2022.
As for Muir, who has drawn extra attention here due to the presence of former Traitors contender Matt Harris, with whom she is in a relationship, the performance was positive. If there was any caveat, it was that she qualified third for the slopestyle before falling far short of her best under the pressure of a final.
‘I am just forgetting about it [slopestyle], it’s in the past now and I am onto this event,’ said Muir. ‘I had a really good evening of skiing, felt great in practice, stoked to put my runs down in qualies and I am excited for the finals.
Scottish skier Kirsty Muir, 21, is into the Big Air final after qualifying in fourth
She will be hoping to add to Team GB’s medal tally of just one goal so far
‘I took a day after slopestyle. I had a nice day that I could process it before I started Big Air training. Pretty quickly we started but I had a day to go through it in my head.
‘There has been a lot of love (in the past five days). Although it was a fourth and I wanted more, it is still fourth in the world on the Olympic stage. I had a lot of love and a lot of support so I am very thankful for that.’
The hierarchy of Team GB’s snow division will be nervously monitoring Muir’s progress on Monday after a disappointing first week of the Games in which none of their three prime medal shots have delivered a podium finish.
Earlier, Team GB’s Tabitha Stoecker fell short in her efforts to win a medal in the women’s skeleton. Having finished no lower than second in the six training runs, the 25-year-old concluded in fifth after the four heats of the final. Her team-mates Freya Tarbit and Amelia Coltman were seventh and ninth respectively, with Austria’s Janine Flock taking gold.
‘I am proud of myself,’ said Stoecker. ‘The last was my best run. I wish I’d done four of those and maybe I’d be standing over there (on the podium) as well.’
