Halfway through the PyeongChang Winter Games

TNS

Shaun White celebrates his gold place finish in the men’s halfpipe snowboard finals in PyeongChang.

DYLAN PADY, Sports Editor | [email protected]

Six days of competition remain in the 2018 PyeongChang Olympic Winter Games, and athletes from all nations look to increase their country’s medal count as the games come to a close.

As of press time, the gold, silver and bronze count are as follows: Norway leads the competition with 26 total medals, (nine gold, nine silver and eight bronze) Germany commands second place with 18 medals (nine gold, five silver and four bronze) and the Netherlands are in third with 13 medals (six gold, five silver and two bronze).

Canada places fourth with 16 medals and the United States is in fifth with 10 total medals. It is worth mentioning that half of the United States’ medals are gold. The Americans also have three silver and two bronze.

Of the five golds for Team USA, Redmond Gerard, Jamie Anderson, Chloe Kim and Shaun White all won snowboarding for both men’s and women’s halfpipe and slopestyle. Arielle Gold didn’t earn a gold but she did earn a bronze medal for snowboarding in the women’s halfpipe.

The remaining first place finish went to Mikaela Shiffrin for alpine skiing in the women’s giant slalom event. Her two runs down the mountain put her in first place with a combined time of 2:20.02.

Ragnhild Mowinckel’s second place effort was extremely close but fell short with a time of 2:20.41 and would have resulted in another gold medal for the already dominating Norwegian squad.

In the next couple days, sports such as curling, figure skating, ice hockey, bobsleighing and snowboarding will really begin to heat up as the winter games enter their final week.

Despite the efforts to remove Russia from the Winter Games after being accused of running a state-sponsored doping program, a Russian medalist was allowed to compete under a neutral flag. However, this athlete is now being accused of doping.

Alexander Krushelnitsky, bronze curling medalist, is accused of using meldonium to increase blood flow and improve exercising ability. If confirmed, Krushelnitsky will have his bronze curling medal revoked.