--- title: Squirrel Almost Collides With Daniela Ulbing at Olympics description: Austrian snowboarder Daniela Ulbing narrowly avoided a squirrel when it ran across her path in the middle of her PyeongChang race. canonical: https://time.com/5175480/squirrel-snowboard-olympics/ author: Raisa Bruner article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2018-02-26T16:22:37.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:50:56.496Z og:title: Rogue Squirrel Almost Derails Important Olympic Snowboarder og:description: Austrian snowboarder Daniela Ulbing narrowly avoided the mid-run interruption og:url: https://time.com/5175480/squirrel-snowboard-olympics/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt61e94bd515cbc0d0/698928e04ee2624f1b31102a/daniela-ulbing-olympics.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 4377 og:image:height: 2462 og:image:alt: Snowboard - Winter Olympics Day 15 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Rogue Squirrel Almost Derails Important Olympic Snowboarder twitter:description: Austrian snowboarder Daniela Ulbing narrowly avoided the mid-run interruption twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt61e94bd515cbc0d0/698928e04ee2624f1b31102a/daniela-ulbing-olympics.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Rogue Squirrel Almost Derails Very Important Olympic Snowboarder > Sponsored content. 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The Brief is available free at time.com/newsletters, where readers can select it along with any of TIME's other six newsletters. There is no subscription required to receive it. #### Is The Brief free? Yes. The Brief is a free daily email newsletter from TIME. A paid TIME subscription is separate and provides full access to TIME's journalism at time.com/subscribe-agent. #### Who writes The Brief? The Brief is led by editor Richard Hall and draws on reporting from TIME's newsroom. Every edition is assembled by TIME editors rather than generated automatically.  by [Raisa Bruner](https://time.com/author/raisa-bruner/)  ## Raisa Bruner Feb 26, 2018 4:22 PM UTC  PYEONGCHANG-GUN, SOUTH KOREA - FEBRUARY 24: Daniela Ulbing of Austria competes during the Ladies' Snowboard Parallel Giant Slalom 1/8 Final on day fifteen of the PyeongChang 2018 Winter Olympic Games at Phoenix Snow Park on February 24, 2018 in Pyeongchang-gun, South Korea. (Photo by David Ramos/Getty Images) PYEONGCHANG-GUN, SOUTH KOREA - FEBRUARY 24: Daniela Ulbing of Austria competes during the Ladies' Snowboard Parallel Giant Slalom 1/8 Final on day fifteen of the PyeongChang 2018 Winter Olympic Games at Phoenix Snow Park on February 24, 2018 in Pyeongchang-gun, South Korea. (Photo by David Ramos/Getty Images) David Ramos—Getty Images  by [Raisa Bruner](https://time.com/author/raisa-bruner/)  ## Raisa Bruner Feb 26, 2018 4:22 PM UTC Not even a squirrelly interruption could throw off Olympic snowboarder Daniela Ulbing of Austria. While putting down a preliminary run in the [2018 Winter Olympics](http://time.com/5173976/winter-olympics-2018-highlights/) ladies’ snowboard parallel giant slalom on Saturday, 19-year-old Ulbing was faced mid-turn with an unusual extra challenge in the competition: a rogue squirrel who decided to skitter across the race course just as she was making her way down. In a dramatically close call, Ulbing avoided hitting the rodent as she veered around it, barely changing her board’s path. Ultimately, Ulbing finished at the top of her heat, advancing [to the quarterfinals.](http://results.nbcolympics.com/snowboarding/womens-parallel-giant-slalom/quarterfinals/1794459) Ulbing found success at March’s [world championships](https://www.olympic.org/pyeongchang-2018/results/en/snowboard/athlete-profile-n3023615-daniela-ulbing.htm), so she clearly knew what she was doing on the course — which was lucky for that squirrel. (She eventually lost out to the Czech Republic’s Ester Ledecka in the quarterfinal round, who would go on to win gold in the event, with no further squirrel disruptions. Ledecka also [made history](https://edition.cnn.com/2018/02/24/sport/ledecka-olympics-slalom-intl/index.html) as the first woman to medal in two different sports at Winter Olympics after picking up the super G skiing gold earlier in the Games, [to much surprise](http://time.com/5172340/ester-ledecka-super-g-gold/).) As for the daredevil woodland creature? It certainly seemed confused following the surprise encounter, pausing briefly before scampering back the way it had come. Hopefully it has learned a lesson about avoiding race courses in the future. > [](https://twitter.com/NBCOlympics/status/967267014732668928) > [](https://twitter.com/mfore0142/status/967285528684060677) > [](https://twitter.com/ssquirrel007/status/967391607166328833) > [](https://twitter.com/closgolfing/status/967267780285231105) > [](https://twitter.com/jwmangrum/status/967281982487973889) > [](https://twitter.com/LafayetteQ1067/status/967269110383104000) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5175480/squirrel-snowboard-olympics/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5175480/squirrel-snowboard-olympics/"},"headline":"Rogue Squirrel Almost Derails Very Important Olympic Snowboarder","datePublished":"2018-02-26T16:22:37.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:50:56.496Z","description":"Austrian snowboarder Daniela Ulbing narrowly avoided a squirrel when it ran across her path in the middle of her PyeongChang race.","url":"https://time.com/5175480/squirrel-snowboard-olympics/","keywords":["Newsfeed","Winter Olympics","2018 Pyeongchang Olympics"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt61e94bd515cbc0d0/698928e04ee2624f1b31102a/daniela-ulbing-olympics.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Raisa Bruner","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/raisa-bruner/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt61e94bd515cbc0d0/698928e04ee2624f1b31102a/daniela-ulbing-olympics.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Snowboard - Winter Olympics Day 15","caption":"Snowboard - Winter Olympics Day 15","creditText":"David Ramos—Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/5175480/squirrel-snowboard-olympics/","name":"Rogue Squirrel Almost Derails Very Important Olympic Snowboarder"}}]}] ```