Li misses chance to add another gold
By Fang Xuan (www.chinadaily.com.cn)
Updated: 2006-02-23 11:03

China's freestyle aerialist Li Nina, an Olympic gold medal favorite in the women’s freestle aerials, turned in a solid but somewhat unspectacular performance at choreographic ski-jumping event, just missing out on a gold medal, and settling for silver.  

Li Nina

Three Chinese athletes placed 1-2-3 after the first round in the competition, which had four Chinese in the 12-strong field.

But World champion and World Cup leader Li Nina would eventually come up short, finishing second to Switzerland's Evelyne Leu, who used a powerful second jump to come from behind for gold.

Leu nailed the landing of her backward triple somersault -- the most difficult jump in the competition -- and got 107.93 points from generous referees. The score was the highest for a single jump in the event.

Li Nina lagged behind Leu by 5 points after scoring 197.49 on her two jumps.

First-round leader Guo Xinxin, trying to execute a difficult jump to maintain her lead, fell in the second round and placed sixth. 

Xu Nannan, the event's silver medalist in the 1998 Nagano Games, completed both of her jumps well, but finished fourth due to a lack of difficulty in her jumps.   

Australia's former champion Alisa Camplin took a surprise bronze just four months after radical surgery on a cruciate knee ligament that threatened to stop her from competing at the Games.

Camplin barely qualified for the final, with a preliminary 10th place, but delivered when it mattered most.

The other Chinese jumper Jiao Wang finished second from last.