Marquis bounces back and wins bronze

ARE, Sweden, March 8, 2008 – Vincent Marquis of Quebec City bounced back from a shaky performance Friday with a bronze medal in FIS Freestyle World Cup dual moguls Saturday.

Vincent Marquis

Marquis won his first two duals, over Jesper Bjoernlund of Sweden and Patrick Deneen of the United States, before losing his semi-final against eventual silver medallist Dale Begg-Smith of Australia.

To clinch his third medal of the World Cup season, Marquis, 23, won his dual against Ruslan Sharifullin of Russia.

“Yesterday (Friday) I didn’t ski well at all. I was charging a lot in practice, then I was caught off guard by the changing (snow) conditions,” said Marquis.

“The result today was good. I wasn’t in the final in the last three contests… So today’s result is a good confidence booster.”

Marquis, who now sits fourth in the season’s overall men’s moguls standings, said that the course was one of the best of the circuit this season.

Begg-Smith, who has clinched the overall men’s title, lost the gold-medal in an upset loss to Dmitriy Reiherd of Kazakhstan.

Reiherd, a past world junior champion who hasn’t competed much this year, was well down in the standings. Then Friday he captured a bronze medal in single moguls, before his surprise victory today.

Marquis had qualified fifth for the 16-skier final. Alexandre Bilodeau of Rosemère, Que., and Pierre-Alexandre Rousseau of Drummondville, Que., had qualified second and third respectively. In the 16-skier elimination round, Rousseau emerged sixth after losing his second dual to Begg-Smith. Rousseau wasn’t complaining, though.

“He (Begg-Smith) got me off the start, but I gave him a really good fight,” said Rousseau. “I’m proud of the way I skied.”

Bilodeau, who also won his first dual, lost to eventual fourth-place Sharifullin in his second dual, to finish ninth. Warren Tanner of West Vancouver was 11th.

Kristi Richards of Summerland, B.C., followed her bronze medal Friday with a fifth-place finish in dual moguls today. She won the qualifying round, but was eliminated by eventual bronze medallist Kayla Snyderman in her second dual.

World Cup rookies and sisters, Chloé and Maxime Dufour-Lapointe of Montreal, were seventh and 10th respectively. Audrey Robichaud of Quebec City finished 12th.

Team veteran Sylvia Kerfoot of Vancouver did not compete after suffering a season-ending knee injury in training yesterday.

Aiko Uemura of Japan won her fourth straight World Cup. She defeated Nikola Sudova of the Czech Republic in the gold-medal dual to clinch the overall women’s moguls title. Richards is currently fourth overall. The season’s final moguls event will be held in Italy, next weekend.

posted March 8, 2008