In what she called the "most nerve-wracking contest I've ever done," Whistler's Mercedes Nicoll absolutely rose to the occasion by throwing down a sixth-place finish in the Olympic women's halfpipe snowboard event on Thursday (Feb. 18), marking an impressive improvement from her last Games experience.
"It was huge to be in my own backyard and make the final," a delighted Nicoll said after her performance at Cypress. "The crowd was ridiculous, and my whole family was here to see me."
Nicoll advanced to the event semifinal by finishing 10th in the qualification round, and she stormed to third place in the semifinal by stomping a first run worthy of 40.1 points. Her best run of the final earned a score of 34.3 points, securing her sixth place even though she fell in her last run while going hard for amplitude.
Now, she said, she's going to party.
"To get sixth is amazing. I'm so happy," Nicoll said.
Australia's Torah Bright captured her country's first medal in Olympic snowboarding with her golden performance in the thrilling final, and Americans Hannah Teter and Kelly Clark expressed their delight in the exciting event as they won the silver and bronze medals. Teter said she would donate everything she made that evening to earthquake-ravaged Haiti.
After crashing in her first run of the finals, Bright redeemed herself with a stellar second run worthy of 45.0 points, including a switch backside 720 trick that no one else tried. Teter, the leader after the first run, couldn't improve her first-run score of 42.4 points, and Clark finished just 0.2 points behind her teammate to win her second Olympic medal, with eight years in between the podium finishes.
"I was standing up there, and was like, 'There's nothing I can do now. Whatever will be, will be,'" Bright said of her mindset going into her final run.
She bested China's world champion Jiayu Liu, who finished fourth, and American Gretchen Bleiler, the 2006 Olympic silver medallist, dropped to 11th by falling in both runs.
At the 2006 Olympics in Turin, Nicoll finished 27th after a fall, and that experience left her wanting more out of her return to the Games. She delivered so much more this time around, riding in her virtual backyard.
She said she watched as fellow Sea to Sky snowboarder Maelle Ricker stormed to her gold medal earlier this week.
"I was watching her on TV and I was just bawling. I was so happy for her," Nicoll said after the qualifying round.
Sarah Conrad of Halifax, N.S., and Palmer Taylor of Collingwood, Ont., finished 18th and 26th, respectively, in the event.
