Riesch takes full advantage of Vonn's mishap

MARIA RIESCH won the Olympic women's super combined for Germany last night after American Lindsey Vonn's quest for two golds in as many days ended with a painful fall.

American Julia Mancuso, silver medallist in Wednesday's downhill won by Vonn, was second while Sweden's Anja Paerson - who decided to compete only at the last minute after a heavy crash the day before - battled to bronze.

Vonn had set the fastest time in the opening downhill but she snagged a gate in the slalom leg, lost a ski and slid out to hand Riesch the gold.

"I'm disappointed but I went down fighting," said Vonn.

"Maria and Julia put in good runs so I knew I had to put in my all. I tried as hard as I could, it just didn't go my way".

Riesch's gold medal was the first by a German woman in Alpine skiing at the Olympics since Katja Seizinger and Hilde Gerg won three titles between them at the 1998 Nagano Games.

Elsewhere, Norwegian Tora Berger held her nerve after delivering a superb shooting performance to win her first Olympic gold medal in the women's 15km individual event.

Two days after finishing fifth in the 10km pursuit, the 28-year-old student missed just one target on a glorious day of sunshine before completing the course in 40 minutes 52.8 seconds.

Berger, who was flawless through the first three rounds of shooting, raised her right arm in celebration as she crossed the finish line before collapsing to the ground with fatigue.

"This is a dream I've had for so long," Berger said after earning Norway its 100th Winter Olympics gold medal in front of a packed stadium.

"This is so good. I was nervous in the last shooting and it really hurt because I missed."

Kazakhstan's Elena Khrustaleva, 20.7 seconds behind, took silver while Darya Domracheva of Belarus had to settle for the bronze.

Six-times world champion Magdalena Neuner of Germany, who won Tuesday's 10km pursuit and was bidding for her third medal of the Games, missed three targets on the way to 10th place.

Berger, whose best previous Olympic finish was fifth in the 4x6km relay at the 2006 Turin Games, was the second athlete to start and she took control after shooting clean in the opening rounds of prone and standing.

Although she missed one target in the final round of standing shooting, she had already built a big enough lead to seal the gold medal as Norwegian flags waved around the finish line and loud cheers rang out from her supporters. Swede Anna Carin Olofsson-Zidek, who was fourth in the 10km pursuit, was 17th.