KRASNAYA POLYANA, Russia — The lasting image of freestyle skiing pioneer Sarah Burke is her ever-present smile, the one that helped inspire kids across Canada to slap on their skis and open their minds.



In an event that Burke’s extraordinary vision helped bring to the Olympics, Dara Howell channeled her hero’s style.



Mouth agape after a spectacular run on slush more suited for a snowcone, Howell continued Canada’s dominance at Rosa Khutor Extreme Park by soaring to gold as women’s slopestyle skiing made a sometimes inauspicious Olympic debut.



“I said the other day that I really hope a Canadian brings home a gold medal and it will be for Sarah,” Howell said. “This medal is definitely for Sarah. She pushed the sport.”



Burke died in 2012 at age 29 following an accident while training on the halfpipe.



A charismatic and accomplished performer and one of the key players in expanding freestyle skiing’s role in the Olympics, she served as a role model to a large swath of the Canadian freestyle team, including the 19-year-old who found herself atop a podium Tuesday. “She always wanted to see the progression,” Howell said. “To see the girls throwing what the guys were throwing ... today I feel like that’s what I did.”



Howell unleashed a switch-900 — an off-axis spin that includes 2 ½ rotations — during a run that finished with a score of 94.20, trouncing the rest of the field on a warm and sometimes frightening day.



Devin Logan of the United States took silver. Kim Lamarre earned bronze to give Canada seven medals in four days of snowboarding and freestyle skiing, including three events in which they took two of the three spots on the podium.



Howell’s triumph was tempered by a series of frightening crashes, including one by teammate Yuki Tsubota.



That ended with Tsubota being carried off the mountain on a stretcher with a possible fractured jaw. Russian Anna Mirtova wiped out during both of her final runs and said she’s heading for knee surgery.



Later in the day, Maiken Caspersen Falla of Norway won the cross-country women’s sprint gold medal.



Ingvild Flugstad Oestberg of Norway took silver and Slovenian Vesna Fabjan won the bronze.



Ola Vigen Hattestad of Norway then won the cross-country men’s sprint gold medal. Teodor Peterson of Sweden took silver and another Swede, Emil Joensson, won the bronze.



Canada’s Alex Bilodeau Monday defended his gold medal in men’s moguls.



Bilodeau became the first freestyle skier to repeat as an Olympic champion, putting together a perfect run in the finals to fend off teammate and rival Mikael Kingsbury.



Bilodeau posted a score of 26.31 on the slushy Extreme Park course in the medal round.



Kingsbury endured a slight form break in the middle of his run and ended up with silver. Alexandr Smyshlyaev of Russia took bronze.



South Korea’s Lee Sang-hwa retained her 500m speed skating crown in a new Olympic record time.



Lee, 24, who has proved untouchable in 2013-14, winning all seven World Cup races she has entered, notched a combined time of 74.70sec from her two races.



Darya Domracheva of Belarus destroyed her Norwegian and Russian rivals in the women’s 10 km biathlon pursuit to take her country’s first gold at the Sochi Olympics.



On day four of the Feb. 7-23 Olympics, most of the action was up in the nearby Caucasus Mountains, where mild temperatures were causing increasing concern about poor snow conditions.



The final training session for Wednesday’s women’s downhill was canceled due to the conditions, and ahead of the Nordic Combined competition on the same day American Bill Demong said of the snow: “It’s not even slushy, it’s just mushy.”



Temperatures are expected to rise to at least 15C (59 Fahrenheit) later this week. — Agencies