Team USA won gold and silver Saturday during the first medal event of the 2026 Paralympic Winter Games.
WASHINGTON — Team USA won gold and silver Saturday in the first medal event of the 2026 Paralympic Winter Games.
Oksana Masters won gold and Kendall Gretsch won silver in the Para biathlon women’s sitting sprint. Both had a clean sweep of their targets.
This is the 20th Paralympic medal for 36-year-old Masters, who also competes in the Summer Games. She has won 10 gold, seven silver and three bronze medals and counting in her collection. She is an eight-time Paralympian across Winter and Summer games. Masters became the first American to win seven medals — in seven events — at a single Paralympics in Beijing 2022.
Gretsch, 33, has also competed before in the Summer Games. She’s a five-time Paralympian and earned her ninth medal Saturday.
Gretsch is a triathlete, biathlete and Para cross-country skier who in Pyeongchang 2018 became the first American to win a biathlon medal at either the Olympic or Paralympic Games. Gretsch won the gold in Para triathlon at Tokyo 2020, becoming just the fifth American — and only the third American woman — to win gold both in the Summer and Winter Paralympics. She added three more medals in Beijing 2022, and another in Paris 2024.
“Every competition is a new challenge, but each one prepares you for the next. It’s about finding strength in the transition,” she told Olympics.com.
Both Paralympic champions are competing in several events during the Winter Games.
What is Para biathlon?
Biathlon combines the physical endurance challenge of cross-country skiing and the precision of target shooting.
The event debuted in the 1988 Innsbruck Paralympic Games for athletes with physical disabilities and in 1992 Albertville for athletes with visual disabilities.
Skiers travel a total distance between 7.5 and 12.5 kilometers and must use a rifle to shoot and hit targets at designated points along the course. Athletes who miss the targets suffer penalties.
The sitting category includes skiers who sit on a sit-ski, where a seat is mounted on two cross-country skis, and athletes use a technique similar to classic cross-country skiing, according to the official Olympic and Paralympic website.