Corinne Suter of Switzerland added the Olympic downhill title to her world gold from last year at Beijing 2022 today ©Getty Images

World champion Corinne Suter of Switzerland has become the Olympic gold medallist in the women's downhill at the Yanqing National Alpine Skiing Centre, beating the injured Italian Sofia Goggia for the title Beijing 2022.

Suter, the 2020 super-G and downhill World Cup champion, snatched back the victory through the finish line after losing it marginally to Goggia, finishing in a time of 1min 31.87sec, 0.18 seconds ahead.

The Italian's silver medal will be one of the best-remembered moments of the Games, as the 2018 Olympic downhill champion was coming into the event still recovering from injury. 

Goggia was involved in a serious crash during this season's Alpine Ski World Cup in Cortina d'Ampezzo just over three weeks ago, spraining her knee, partially tearing an anterior cruciate ligament, damaging her tendon and getting a minor fracture in her fibula.

She was rehabilitating prior to the Games and withdrew from other events, including the super-G of which she was one of the favourites, to prevent flaring up the injuries anymore and instead focused on the downhill.

The Italian did take the lead before Suter's run, but also lost time through the final gate, giving the Swiss skier an advantage through the finish line.

"The reason why I have so much effort is because I wanted an outcome like this one today," said Goggia. 

"Sometimes things don't work as you want to, but I really gave everything I could.

"I couldn't have done more than this today."

Sofia Goggia, left, and Nadia Delago, right, celebrated with the Italian team following their silver and bronze medals, which were hard earned for different reasons ©Getty Images
Sofia Goggia, left, and Nadia Delago, right, celebrated with the Italian team following their silver and bronze medals, which were hard earned for different reasons ©Getty Images

Italy also took the bronze medal, with Nadia Delago a considerable margin off the top two, 0.57 seconds behind.

Delago made it onto the podium having so far not achieved the feat at a World Cup or World Championships.

The 24-year-old finished 15th in the downhill at last year's World Championships at Cortina d'Ampezzo  and has five top 10 finishes - all in downhill - during this season's World Cup, with a best of fourth in Zauchensee.

Kira Weidle of Germany was 0.71 seconds off the winner in fourth and Elena Curtoni made it three Italians in the top five.

Some of the event's top names struggled to get near Suter today.

Ramona Siebenhofer of Austria, third in overall World Cup downhill this season, was 12th, 1.94 seconds behind the winner and in front of Swiss pair Jasmine Flury and Lara Gut-Behrami in 15th and 16th respectively.

Both have made the podium this season, with Gut-Behrami winning in Zauchensee.

She had won two Olympic medals, including gold in the super-G title, at Beijing 2022 but was unable to add to her collection today.

Mikaela Shiffrin of the United States, who is not a downhill specialist, was 18th.