Alpine snowboarder goes for 2nd career medal

Lee Sang-ho of Korea in action, during the qualifying round of the FIS Alpine Snowboard Parallel Giant Slalom, Jan. 12, in Scuol, Switzerland. AP-Yonhap

MILAN — Alpine snowboarder Lee Sang-ho will try to come through with South Korea's first medal of the Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics, Sunday.

Lee will compete in the men's parallel giant slalom at Livigno Snow Park in Livigno, some 230 kilometers north of Milan, with the qualification set to start at 9:30 a.m. Sunday, or 5:30 p.m. the same evening in South Korea.

Lee won silver in this event at the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics, becoming the first South Korean to win an Olympic medal in a snowboarding or a skiing event.

At Beijing 2022, Lee lost in the quarterfinals by 0.01 second, and he arrived in Italy in fine form, having won the gold medal at his final World Cup event prior to the Olympics in Slovenia, Jan. 31.

In the qualification run, boarders each take two runs, and the top 16 based on the combined times will advance to the elimination round.

Then athletes will go head-to-head in a knockout bracket, with each race featuring two athletes on side-by-side courses -- hence the descriptor "parallel."

Lee will be one of three South Koreans in the men's parallel giant slalom, joined by Cho Wan-hee and Kim Sang-kyum. Jeong Hae-rim will compete in the women's parallel giant slalom, Sunday.