Sweden stamped their mark on the Winter Olympics yesterday with Alpine skier Anja Paerson winning the women's slalom and cross country athlete Bjoern Lind helping the country equal their previous best medal haul.
Paerson's success under floodlights gave Sweden their fourth gold of the Games and their 10th medal in all.
With a 5-4 victory over Norway to reach the women's curling final and a 6-2 defeat of the Swiss in the ice hockey quarter-finals, Sweden shone brightly on day 12.
Finland, too, had a stellar day, beating the United States 4-3 in their ice hockey quarter-final.
Like Sweden, the Austrians have also notched up a bumper medal haul, despite their Games being marred by a doping scandal swirling round their biathlon and cross country teams.
The medal tally stood at 19 last night, including eight golds, after Austrians Nicole Hosp and Marlies Schild took silver and bronze behind Paerson, who won gold despite being injured. Germany lead on 22, including nine golds.
Croatia's Janica Kostelic, who sealed her title as the most successful woman Olympic Alpine skier in history in Turin, was forced down the table into fourth.
Away from the piste, Olympic officials said 10 Austrian biathlon and cross country skiing athletes would have to wait longer for the results of doping tests, taken during a night raid on Saturday.
"Laboratory analysis is not yet complete. Analysis by the lab needs to be done very thoroughly and efficiently. This is not easy work," said Giselle Davies, director of communications for the International Olympic Committee (IOC).
The Austrians have criticised officials for disrupting their training schedules with the raids, triggered by a tip-off that a coach, banned from the Olympics over a blood doping affair four years ago, was meeting Austrian athletes.
The IOC said it would launch a disciplinary investigation into why the Austrians ignored the ban on coach Walter Mayer.
In an unhappy twist, he is in a psychiatric hospital in Austria after he crashed into police cars and was reported in Austrian media to have mentioned suicide.
Two other athletes, Wolfgang Perner and Wolfgang Rottmann, fled after the raids, fearing prosecution after Italian police confiscated something which "may have been illegal". Another coach left soon after the raids. He has been suspended.
Austria has also launched a commission to probe the claims.
Former ski champion Franz Klammer lamented the scandal.
"It is a great surprise that this is happening," said the 1976 Olympic downhill champion and five-time World Cup winner.
"They had exactly this sort of scandal at the last Olympics and now for the same thing to be happening with the same people is just beyond understanding."
The medals for the two Austrian women in the slalom were welcome, but the day was Paerson's, who earlier said she had hurt her knee when she leaned back as she warmed up. She clocked the fastest first leg.
"I was attacking as much as I could because I knew I had to do my best after having no luck in the combined slalom," Paerson, who was disappointed to take bronze in that event and in the downhill, told reporters after the first leg.
Earlier, Lind also gave his country a record-equalling third cross country skiing gold medal. He won his second gold in the individual sprint. The Swedes also won three at St Moritz in 1948 and Sarajevo in 1984.
McGarry 42nd in women's slalom
Ireland's Kirsty McGarry finished 42nd overall in the women's slalom at Sestriere yesterday.
McGarry was in 48th position after the afternoon's first run with a time of 49.64 seconds. She was 7.26 seconds down on the eventual leader, Anja Paerson of Sweden, at that stage.
She was 41st in the second run with a time of 52.79 seconds to move up through the field.
The event, on the Giovanni A Agnelli course, was run off in less-than-ideal conditions.
