Maggie Voisin’s first Olympic experience ended before it could truly begin.
Four years ago Voisin qualified for the Sochi Games in slopestyle skiing at age 15. Had she competed in Russia, she would have become the youngest U.S. winter Olympian since 1972. Instead, she broke her right ankle in a training run and had to withdraw.
On Saturday, she earned another shot at the Games.
Voisin finished second in the slopestyle skiing competition at the Toyota U.S. Grand Prix stop at Snowmass in Colorado, Colorado, to secure her spot at the Olympic Winter Games PyeongChang 2018 next month.
Her second-run score of 89.00 was behind the winning score of 91.60 set by Johanne Killi of Norway in the first run. Great Britain’s Isabel Atkin was third with an 87.80.
Devin Logan, who won the Olympic silver medal in Sochi for Team USA, was sixth.
Although no longer the youngest in U.S. history at age 19, Voisin does have the potential of becoming the youngest Olympic champion in a freestyle skiing event in South Korea.
The redemption was a long time coming for Voisin, who returned from her broken ankle only to tear her ACL in her first season back, forcing her to miss the entire 2014-15 season. Since then, though, she’s reestablished herself as a top contender in the sport.
Voisin’s hopes of returning to the Olympics got a boost in February of 2017, when she won the first Olympic qualifying event, which took place at Mammoth Mountain in California. That combined with her runner-up finish on Saturday to give the teenager enough points to secure her bid to PyeongChang.
There are still two more Olympic qualifying events for women’s slopestyle skiing and three additional women are expected to join Voisin on the team.
Chrös McDougall has covered the Olympic movement for TeamUSA.org since 2009 on behalf of Red Line Editorial, Inc. He is based in Minneapolis-St. Paul.
