India’s best-ever show at Winter Olympics: Skier Arif finishes 45th

India’s lone participant in the Winter Olympics, alpine skier Arif Khan, fi nished 45th in the giant slalom event on Sunday. The 31-year-old from Baramulla district in Jammu and Kashmir clocked a combined time of 2 minute 47.24 seconds from two races in diffi cult weather conditions at the Yanqing National Alpine Skiing Centre.

Khan did better in Race 2 as he clocked 1:24.89, ending at 44th out of 45 skiers who could complete it. Nine skiers failed to fi nish Race 2 which was delayed by nearly four hours due to bad weather.

Despite a poor fi nish, this was India’s bestever performance in men’s giant slalom event at Winter Olympics. Polish-born Jeremy Bujakowski, India’s fi rst-ever Winter Olympian, had fi nished 65th at Grenoble 1968.

His combined time, which saw him fi nish 45th overall, was 37.89 seconds behind gold winner Marco Odermatt of Switzerland who clocked a combined time of 2:09.35.

It’s one of my dreams to be at Winter Olympics and this is my first time. It really means a lot. It’s a great message back to our country, to our people to join winter sports in future,” Khan was quoted as saying by ‘Olympics.com’. (Agencies)