LIVIGNO, Italy Feb 19 (Reuters) - For the world's elite athletes, failing to grasp an Olympic medal hurts - and especially so for the person who finishes fourth, among the very best in the world but just one step short of the podium.
Years of gruelling physical work and mental preparation can end with missing out on the medal places and the global recognition that they bring.
At the Milano Cortina Games, German snowboarder Annika Morgan stood in the bronze medal position with one rider to go. That rider was New Zealand powerhouse Zoi Sadowski Synnott, whoput down a stellar slopestyle run that bounced Morgan into fourth.
"It sucks a lot. That's all I can say," Morgan said as she stood on the slopes in the Alpine town of Livigno. "Someone has to be fourth. And it's me."
Adding insult to injury, she was wearing a bib with her assigned number for the race - four.
"I ended up with my bib number," she said. "Worst place to be, but whatever."
French Alpine skier Nils Allegre struggled to accept his fourth-place finish in the super‑G, finishing a mere 0.03 seconds slower than the bronze medallist.
Allegre also came in fourth in this season's downhill and super-G World Cup races in Val Gardena, and in the Val Gardena downhill last season.
"I'm gutted because my career has often been like this so far: other guys always seem to have the hundredths on their side, and I never do," he said after his Bormio race.
"Three hundredths in a lifetime is nothing — and today it would have made all the difference."
Americans Frankie del Duca and Joshua Williamson found themselves in the familiar fourth-place spot behind three teams from Germany at the end of the two-man bobsleigh. They also finished fourth in the two- and four-man events at the World Championship in 2025.
"There's a lot of positives to take from this, but it's really hard as well to be so close, so often," del Duca said, adding he wanted a medal "for our support system (team) as much, if not more than, for us".
British freestyle skier Kirsty Muir had to absorb the fourth-place disappointment twice - in slopestyle and big air.
"It’s just a bittersweet feeling," Muir said with tears in her eyes after her slopestyle finish.
"I'm so stoked with how I skied tonight. I put it all on the line in the third jump, I went for it, and I can't be mad about that," she said. "It's a bit of a nasty position again to be in fourth, but I really do feel proud of my skiing."
A reporter asked if she could take pride in being the fourth-best female skier in the world in her events.
"I will, I will," she said. "A lot of people say that, and in the moment, it's hard to take in, just because obviously the only ones that get recognised are the ones on the podium."
(Reporting by Lisa Richwine; Additional reporting by Lisa Jucca and Mitch Phillips; Editing by Hugh Lawson)
