New Zealand has won it's third medal at the Beijing Winter Paralympics with Adam Hall picking up bronze in the standing Super Combined ski event.
Adam Hall Photo: PHOTOSPORT
The Super Combined features a Super G run and a slalom run with the fastest combined time winning the race.
Hall, who is competing at his fifth games was just a quarter of a second slower than Finland's Santeri Kiiveri in second place.
Hall completed the Super-G course in 1.15.33. With the snow heating up fast in the last hour combined with two flat sections, the course wasn't optimal for Hall, but he was happy with the run, considering the conditions. Hall's time was 4.45 seconds slower than the leading Paralympian Arthur Bauchet of France, giving him a 15th place finish.
"If I was within 5 seconds or so on the Super-G, I knew I had a shot," said Hall.
It was in the second half of the Super Combined, the Slalom, that we saw the dramatic turnaround of Hall's fortunes. With what commentators described as "millimetre perfect, massive precision" Hall skied from 15th place into the lead in a time of 39.44 seconds. Many skilled skiers were to follow, however, and Hall describes an anxious wait while the majority completed the course.
"It's the worst position to put yourself in. You're waiting down here for so long."
No one could beat him in the Slalom until the very end, when France's Arthur Bauchet was just 0.06 of a second faster. Bauchet took gold, while Finland's Santeri Kiveri took silver with a combined time just a quarter of a second faster than Hall's.
Hall says the course today needs a dancer's rhythm:
"With the vertical drop that this course has, and the steepness of it, which is suited to me, you definitely had to have your disco shoes on, for sure!"
Hall will defend his Slalom title on Saturday.
Corey Peters won a gold in the Downhill and a silver in the Super G.