Federica Brignone: Italy's alpine skiing champion enters record books with Beijing 2022 'dream'

At her fourth Olympic Winter Games, Italy alpine skiing star Federica Brignone won a silver medal in the giant slalom, making her just the fifth woman to earn two medals in the event.

The Beijing 2022 silver, which she won behind gold medallist Sara Hector of Sweden, and ahead of Lara Gut-Behrami in third, is added to the bronze medal she won in giant slalom at PyeongChang 2018.

And at 31 years and 208 days old, it also makes Brignone the oldest medallist in the event, surpassing Sochi 2014 gold medallist Tina Maze of Slovenia, who was 30 years and 292 days.

It’s been a brilliant career and storied journey for Italy’s skiing champion, who arrived in Beijing with the goal of again standing on a Winter Olympics podium.

"Four years ago I was third, and before coming here I said if I come back with one medal that would be a great dream for me. Doing it at the first race, it's amazing," she said.

"It feels great. Being here - and doing it on that day and being on the Olympic podium - is just amazing."

Born in Milan and residing in La Salle in Aosta Valley, Brignone is an incredibly active athlete who surfs, climbs, dances, goes enduro biking, ski touring and kite surfing, among other hobbies.

Following in the footsteps of her two-time Olympian mother Maria-Rosa Quario, Federica made her international debut in 2005 and was the 2009 junior world cup combined champion, before her decorated senior career.

At Beijing 2022, after the field earlier watched defending champion Mikaela Shiffrin miss a gate early in her first run and fail to finish, the Italian was calm and composed, channelling all of her experience.

"My skiing is good in those conditions, because you have always to be on the edge like Sara (Hector) and this is one of my attitudes when I'm skiing," she said.

"Even if I do more metres, it was faster than blocking and trying to be more straight. That was my technique.

"Then for my head I tried just to focus and focus on my skiing, and that was the best I could do. Actually, it's also the hardest to do. I'm so proud that I did it. It's all out, but with your head.

"My head worked really well, and I’m so grateful. I was just saying myself to ski, to think about my skiing, and that’s what I did, first run and second run," she added.

Brignone, at her fourth Games, was part of a seasoned podium for the giant slalom at Beijing 2022 and Hector and Gut-Behrami were competing at their third Olympic Winter Games.

It’s experience and strength which inspires so many, with Gut-Behrami paying tribute to Brignone and Hector.

"Somewhere in your career you realise how much it costs to every athlete to fight, to be there all the time, to stand up when you crash, when things go bad.

"Fede (Brignone) and me are about the same age and Sara (Hector); I know her since a long time, she’s been struggling a lot over the last seasons to go back in shape and now she’s skiing amazing," she said.

"I just really like when women still fight and we’re still there after a lot of seasons, and we’re still able to win and be on the podium. I really appreciate that."

The women’s alpine skiing competition continues at Beijing 2022 from Wednesday 9 February, when the slalom event is scheduled to take place.

Keep up with all the action in our Live Blog updates throughout Beijing 2022, here.