Janine Flock grabs a tense midway lead in women’s skeleton, chasing elusive Olympic gold

By: Tim Reynolds, The Associated Press Posted: 12:26 PM CST Friday, Feb. 13, 2026

CORTINA D'AMPEZZO, Italy (AP) — Janine Flock has yet another chance at the gold medal that always seems to escape her grasp.

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CORTINA D'AMPEZZO, Italy (AP) — Janine Flock has yet another chance at the gold medal that always seems to escape her grasp.

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Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 13/02/2026 (204 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

CORTINA D’AMPEZZO, Italy (AP) — Janine Flock has yet another chance at the gold medal that always seems to escape her grasp.

The 36-year-old Austrian — a four-time Olympian with no medals to show for it — held the midpoint lead in the women’s skeleton race at the Milan Cortina Games on Friday night, with three Germans and two British sliders taking up the next five spots.

Flock — who found tons of speed at the bottom of the track in her second heat, something few sliders could manage — finished her two runs in 1 minute, 54.48 seconds.

Austria's Janine Flock arrives at the finish during a women's skeleton run at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy, Friday, Feb. 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino)

Susanne Kreher (1:54.52), 2018 Olympic silver medalist Jacqueline Pfeifer (1:54.61) and reigning Olympic gold medalist Hannah Neise (1:54.85) hold the 2-3-4 spots for Germany, while Tabitha Stoecker (1:55.01) and Freya Tarbit (1:55.16) have the next two spots for Britain.

For the U.S., Kelly Curtis is 10th at the midway mark and Mystique Ro is 17th. The final two heats of the event are Saturday.

If there was a designation for best women’s skeleton slider without a gold medal from the sport’s biggest races — worlds and the Olympics — Flock would hold that title with ease. Her resume is beyond impressive: she’s a three-time World Cup overall champion with 15 World Cup race wins, 45 World Cup medals overall, and has silver and bronze medals from the world championships.

The good news for Flock: In each of the four previous Olympics where the women’s skeleton competition was contested over four runs, the midpoint leader has never finished worse than second.

The bad news for Flock: She’ll have to exorcise a bit of a demon. She had the lead with one run left in the 2018 Pyeongchang Olympics, then found all kinds of trouble and finished out of the medals entirely.