Nothing like a good old Taieri attitude to make your dreams come true.
- Subscriber: No words to describe what this means: Hall
- Editorial: Sound of silver
Adam Hall has written his name into New Zealand sporting history books again, producing a scintillating final run to win silver in the men’s slalom standing to wrap up the Winter Paralympics in Italy yesterday.
Competing in a record-equalling sixth games, Hall collected his sixth medal to become New Zealand most decorated Winter Paralympian alongside Patrick Cooper.
‘‘After the first run, sitting in fourth, I just had to lay everything out there.
‘‘I knew waking up to all that snow that I had to bring out that Taieri attitude that is just an ordinary winter day.
‘‘I just had to attack it and let it rip. It was years and years of experience and leaving nothing behind.’’
The 38-year-old maintained his composure on his second run to surge into second with a combined time of 1min 31.38sec.
Russian Aleksei Bugaev, of Russia, won gold and Robin Cuche, of Switzerland, rounded out the podium with bronze.
Hall, who grew up in Outram, but now lives in Wanaka, made his Paralympic debut in 2006 and was overcome with emotion after adding another medal to his tally.
But seeing his loved ones in the crowd added to the milestone.
‘‘It feels so special to have so many family and friends in the crowd today, including my wife, Elitsa and daughter, Gracelynn, who is 7 and hopefully able to remember this for the rest of her life and bring these memories back home.
‘‘This means so much to so many people and to have so many family and friends here from near and far is amazing.’’
