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Fletcher out of snowboard, Kosglow advances
Associated Press
PARK CITY — Rosey Fletcher had to smile to keep herself from crying. America's best women's snowboard racer failed to make the finals of the Olympic parallel giant slalom Thursday.
"There's nothing I can do now," Fletcher said. "The race is over, I tried to do my best, and it didn't work out."
Americans Sondra Van Ert and Lisa Odynski will join Fletcher on the sidelines for Friday's finals. Lisa Kosglow finished seventh and was the only American to make it into the top 16.
Maria Kirchgasser of Austria won qualifying in 41.44 seconds. In second was 1998 Olympic gold medalist Karine Ruby of France, who was .01 seconds behind. Van Ert finished 17th, missing the finals by .09 seconds.
"I'm ecstatic," Kosglow said. "We always say, the Olympics are just another event, but look at this crowd. Nobody comes out to watch snowboarding racing like this anywhere else."
Indeed, it was a grand stage, and an estimated crowd of 8,000 came to watch what is largely regarded as the less-exciting cousin to snowboarding's main event, the halfpipe.
In this year's Olympics, the format has changed. In the finals, racers are seeded according to their qualifying times, and they go head-to-head in an elimination format until a winner is decided.
"The great thing about it, is anything can happen," Kosglow said.
But not for Fletcher, the popular Alaskan who was widely viewed as the best hope among American women for a medal in this sport dominated by Europeans.
Her hopes ended quickly, on the fifth gate, when she caught a back edge and started spinning out. She was 4 seconds off the leader's pace by the midpoint, and even though she finished strong, she knew it was over.
Both she and Kosglow said the snow felt much different than what they normally train and compete on. Unlike most venues, at the Olympics, the snowboarding course gets extra grooming and it feels much smoother.
"Kind of like glass," Kosglow said. "We call it Alien."
Fletcher felt like calling it something else.
"Just really different, I guess," she said. "I don't know how to explain it."
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February 14, 2002
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