PARK CITY ? Just as many expected, the Olympic gold medal in women's aerials went to an Australian.
But instead of the brunette who'd dominated the sport for the past three years, it was Jacqui Cooper's less experienced and far less decorated teammate, Alisa Camplin, who won the event Monday at Deer Valley.
Cooper flew home to Australia Sunday to undergo knee surgery to repair a ligament that she tore during a practice jump last week.
Camplin, a 26-year-old native of Melbourne, began crying the minute she landed her second jump almost perfectly. She whispered "please, please, please" as she waited for the scores of Russia's Olga Koroleva, the last woman to jump.
When the scores came up, she covered her mouth and dropped her skis to hug the silver medalist. Her first thoughts were of her family, whom she'd told to stay in Australia so she could concentrate on the competition. She was worried about the expense and feeling the need to take care of them.
"I didn't come to the Olympic Games to have fun until after my event is over," Camplin said. "After I landed my second jump, I was a little sad and lonely. Then I heard my sister screaming. . . . It's a scream I've heard since I was 18 months old. I'm so happy. For me, this doesn't seem real yet."
Camplin, wrapped in an Australian flag, was flanked by two Canadian women, Veronica Brenner, who won silver in her second Olympic appearance, and Diedre Dionne, who will take home a bronze in her first Olympic competition. Their scores were 193.47, 190.02 and 189.26, respectively.
The three medal winners train together and all seemed uneasy with their newfound fame.
While Brenner and Dionne are lifelong skiers, Camplin decided she wanted to be an aerialist before she'd even skied. Coming from sunny Australia, she was a track and field star and former gymnast. Then, at 19, she saw a woman aerialist competing and found her way to the Australian Olympic Winter Sports Institute.
She learned the tricks even before they taught her to ski, and she trained by jumping into a leech-infested, scum-covered pond.
"I think it made us tougher," she said. "We had to do it the hard way. . . . I've sold everything to be here."
Camplin, who's suffered nine concussions and almost quit on the advice of a doctor in Calgary, said when most of the athletes were resting last April she was doing flips into the copper-colored water and trudging up the muddy hillside.
"I did about 600 singles before (summer training) even began," she said.
And while both Camplin and Brenner were assured a medal as Koroleva prepared for her second jump, Dionne said the few-minute wait was agonizing.
"Fourth place is nice, but no fun," Dionne said. "As soon as they put the score up, I was so excited I started shaking."
E-MAIL: adonaldson@desnews.com