Canada wins bronze in first Mixed Team Snowboard Cross event at Olympics

Canada's Meryeta O'Dine and Eliot Grondin celebrate their bronze medal in mixed team snowboard cross at the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics in Zhangjiakou, China on Saturday, Feb. 12, 2022. (Sean Kilpatrick/CP)

Canada has secured a spot on the inaugural Olympic podium for Mixed Team Snowboard Cross as Eliot Grondin and Meryeta O'Dine have won the bronze medal.

It is the second medal for both Grondin and O'Dine at the Beijing Winter Olympics. Grondin, of St-Romuald, Que., won the silver in men's snowboard cross while O'Dine, of Prince George, B.C., earned bronze in the women's snowboard cross.

It is Canada's 13th medal in Beijing and eighth bronze.

This is the first time the mixed event has been contested at an Olympic Games. It features a two-person relay race consisting of one male and one female competitor per team. Each race begins with four boarders from different teams leaving the gates simultaneously. As the first boarder traverses the course, the teammates prepare themselves at the top of the hill.

The male teammates go first and once their official times are logged the female competitors will be released from the starting gate at corresponding staggered times. The first team to have both competitors cross the finish line, barring contact infractions and/or disqualifications, is the winner.

Americans Nick Baumgartner and Lindsey Jacobellis won the gold and Italy's Omar Visintin and Michela Moioli claimed silver. Italy's second team of Lorenzo Sommariva and Caterina Carpano finished fourth.

There was some drama in the final as O'Dine and Carpano collided mid-way through the second leg, giving Jacobellis and Moioli a wide gap to race for the gold. Both O'Dine and Carpano were able to finish the race with the Canadian coming in ahead to claim the bronze.

"Oh it was so stressful. When the crash happened they just kept [showing it on the big screen] the first two [Jacobellis and Moioli] and I had no idea what was going on," Grondin told the CBC in the mixed zone after the win.

"I didn't know if she was OK, or anything. So I was just waiting and hoping she was fine and that she kept going. And then I saw her name on the split times and I said, 'come on.' Then she jumped to the finish line and I was like, 'we did it.' It's crazy, unreal."

"There was four of us all coming into that jump section pretty tight with each other and I saw Caterina's board going up and I was heading down and she kept going up and I was like, 'okay, I'm about to get landed on in the final,'" O'Dine told the CBC. "[I] dug my head into the snow, popped it up and realized that I was doing a little bit better than she was. I just instantly got up and started hiking up the jump to try and get on the podium."

Liam Moffatt of Truro, N.S. and Tess Critchlow of Prince George, B.C. -- Team Canada 2 -- finished third in their quarterfinal race and did not advance.

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