LIVIGNO – Canadian Eliot Grondin wore a smile with his silver medal Thursday after being edged by Austrian Alessandro Haemmerle for the second straight Olympics in snowboard cross.
In Beijing, Grondin lost by two one-hundredths of a second. On Thursday at the Milan Cortina Games, it was three one-hundredths.
Another live-and-learn moment in a sport where anything can happen and usually does.
“I feel pretty good. Not many people here have two silver medals,” said the 24-year-old from Ste-Marie, Que., who also won a bronze in the mixed team event four years ago. “Obviously I wanted gold. It was really close — again. But it was a good week. I had fun. I have no regrets. I did my best. At the end that’s all I could do.”
The 32-year-old Haemmerle, competing in his fourth Olympics, joins France’s Pierre Vaultier (2014 and ’18) as a repeat Olympic snowboard cross champion.
“Haemmerle’s a double Olympic champion but he’s been doing it for I don’t know how many years. So he has the experience,” said Grondin, the reigning world champion. “And he’s had those races where he probably wanted to bang his head against the wall.
“You just have to learn from it and become a better athlete.”
Austrian Jakob Dusek won bronze behind Grondin.
Snowboard cross is an all-action affair with four racers hurtling down an icy course at speeds that can exceed 80 km/h.
The course at Livigno Snow Park, longer and wider than most World Cup runs with a technically demanding start section, is 1,110 metres long with a vertical drop of 154 metres.
It made for plenty of drama on the day with photo finishes and the odd disqualification and crash.
The final was a crackerjack with Grondin facing Dusek, the 2023 world champion, rising French star Aidan Chollet, the only man to beat Grondin’s time in the morning seeding round, and Haemmerle.
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The quartet had survived three knockout rounds to get to the big final at Livigno Snow Park.
Grondin is known for his fast starts — his “super power” according to Brendan Matthews, Canada Snowboard’s vice-president of business development and partnerships — but Chollet matched him this time.
The Frenchman took the lead, with Grondin stalking him for the rest of the race, which turned in a frenetic final stretch. All four were vying for the front as they reached the final jump, with Grondin nosing in front and Chollet fading slightly.
But it was Haemmerle who carried the most speed off the jump, allowing him to pass Grondin with Dusek a further 12 one-hundredths of a second behind the Canadian. All three medallists ended up on the snow after lunging for the line.
“I think maybe 15 metres less, then it would have been different,” mused Grondin. “But that’s life.”
Grondin said he knew Chollet would be fast out of the gate, so elected to let him go and look for the pass. But he couldn’t get the timing right to make the move.
“I was arriving always too early with too much speed, so that was the problem,” he said. “Maybe I should been a more patient at the top, let the gap grow a little more and then come with more momentum.”
Canadians had hoped for double gold in Livigno on Thursday with moguls ace Mikael Kingsbury, a close friend of Grondin’s, competing 2.5 kilometres away at the Livigno Aerials and Moguls Park. But Kingsbury also left with silver.
Grondin was clocked second in the 32-man field in the opening seeding run that saw all the riders make a solo trip down the course.
Grondin’s time of 1:06.75 stood until Chollet, the 15th man down the course, recorded a 1:06.37. That guaranteed Chollet and Grondin the red bib that allows racers to choose their lane for all the knockout rounds all the way to the final when it went to Chollet.
The next closest rider, Germany’s Leon Ulbricht, was another 1.19 seconds back. Evan Bichon of Mackenzie, B.C., was seeded 11th and Liam Moffatt of Truro, N.S., 19th.
The top 20 finishers in the first timing run moved on, seeded one through 20. The remaining 12 competed in a second timing run to determine seedings 21 through 32.
All 32 racers made the knockout round, according to their seeding, where they competed in four-man knockout races with the top two moving on. Bichon, who had to switch boards in the start gate due to binding issues, and Moffatt both failed to survive the first knockout round.
Grondin cruised through the first three knockout rounds, relegating Haemmerle to second place in both the quarterfinal and semifinal. Prior to the final, the only time Grondin trailed in a race was briefly in the semifinal when Haemmerle passed him, only to see the Canadian regain the lead soon after.
Grondin was just 16 when he made his Olympic debut in 2018, finishing 36th. He was the youngest man and second-youngest Canadian athlete at Pyeongchang.
He has risen to the top since then, winning back-to-back Crystal Globes in 2023-24 and 2024-25.
Canada now has eight Olympic medals in snowboard cross (one gold, four silver and three bronze). Maelle Ricker, who now coaches Grondin, won the gold in Turin in 2006.
Mike Robertson, with a silver in Vancouver in 2010, is the only other Canadian man to make an Olympic podium in the discipline.
Grondin’s medal was Canada’s sixth of the Milan Cortina Games.
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This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 12, 2026.
