Snowboard champion Ester Ledecka claims shock super-G skiing gold ahead of Anna Leith

The Czech is the first athlete to compete in both skiing and snowboarding at the Olympics, and she stunned Veith when beating the Austrian by one hundredth of a second.

The 22-year-old's reaction after crossing the finish line told the story, as she looked on in disbelief for almost half a minute before facing the camera and asking, "How did that happen?"

And after claiming that she thought the scoreboard was incorrect, Ledecka said: “I really don’t know what happened. This must be some mistake, they’re going to switch the time for some others. I just saw my mum, we were watching each other, we didn’t understand.

“I was probably the only snowboarder on site. All the other girls didn’t risk a lot. There must be a lot of pressure on them. I was just trying to do my best run.”

Ledecka is a world champion snowboarder, having won the parallel giant slalom last year, and she will go for gold in that event on Thursday.

Veith (1.21.12) had looked like becoming the first woman to win back-to-back gold medals in Olympic super-G, but ultimately had to settle for silver.

Meanwhile, Liechtenstein's Tina Weirather took bronze in 1:21.22 after she had earlier edged Swiss World Cup leader Lara Gut off the top of the timesheets by the slenderest of margins in a thrilling race.

American Lindsey Vonn went out first but failed to win a medal after making a mistake before the final jump, skiing wide into soft snow and finishing in 1:21.49.

The 33-year-old will have another chance to become the oldest female medallist in Olympic Alpine skiing in her favoured downhill event on the same mountain next week.