Julia Marino Wins First Medal for Team USA With Silver in Women's Slopestyle

The 24-year-old won her first-ever Olympic medal, bringing home the silver after scoring an 87.68 in the snowboarding slopestyle final Sunday.
Julia Marino Wins First Medal for Team USA With Silver in Women's Slopestyle
Julia Marino Wins First Medal for Team USA With Silver in Women's Slopestyle /

Things didn't look great for Julia Marino after posting a 30.61 in her first run at Sunday's women's slopestyle final. But despite starting from the back of the pack and dealing with the sub-zero morning temperatures, the 24-year-old American put together the run of her life in her second heat—and got Team USA its first medal at the Beijing Games in the process.

Marino scored an 87.68 with a near-flawless second run and momentarily held the lead before New Zealand's Zoi Sadowski-Synnott put together a 92.88 in her final run to capture the gold.

With her big score already in hand, Marino took a chance on a 1080 on the final jump of her third run but couldn't quite nail the landing. Still, it was a strong showing in what was her Olympics debut. The native of Westport, Conn., won gold in slopestyle at the 2017 Winter X Games in Aspen, and also has two silvers and two bronzes in her X Games career.

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Nick Selbe
NICK SELBE

Nick Selbe is a programming editor at Sports Illustrated who frequently writes about baseball and college sports. Before joining SI in March 2020 as a breaking/trending news writer, he worked for MLB Advanced Media, Yahoo Sports and Bleacher Report. Selbe received a bachelor's in communication from the University of Southern California.