By PA Sport Staff

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Alain Baxter said he thought he had blown it when he placed eighth after the first run of the men's Olympic slalom at Deer Valley.

But the 28-year-old from Aviemore improved five places on his second attempt to become the first Briton ever to win a medal on snow.

"It is unbelievable. I just don't understand. Incredible," Baxter said after watching his big rivals make a mess of the tough 'Know You Don't' course in the Wasatch Mountains and elevate him onto the podium.

"I came here thinking if I had two perfect runs I could get a medal. After my first run I thought I would be fourth or fifth, but there you have it."

After realising he had got the bronze in the bag, Baxter, sporting the shock of blue hair which had caused controversy in the build-up to the Games, and which could have had him banned, was embraced by his Austrian coach Christian Schwalger and half-brother Noel, who finished 21st.

Baxter's bronze is Britain's third medal of the Games, sealing a remarkable turnaround in fortune after a dismal first week.

Alex Coomber and Rhona Martin's curlers had already ensured the nation's best Winter Games result for 66 years.

Baxter's medal charge was extraordinary. Posting a second run exactly two seconds slower than his first, Baxter lost a place to Frenchman Sebastien Amiez.

His hopes of at least equalling a British man's previous Olympic alpine best, Martin Bell's eighth in the Calgary downhill in 1988, appeared to hang in the balance.

But he watched with increasing bewilderment as the big names in front of him made a hash of the tough lower section of the course.

Norwegian Kjetil Andre Aamodt, the most decorated Olympic alpine skiier ever and already with two golds in the bag from these Games, was six tenths of a second slower than the Scot and dropped to seventh.

Austrian pair Benjamin Raich and Kilian Albrecht also struggled, while Croatian World Cup leader Ivica Kostelic crashed out.

When big favourite Bode Miller risked all in his attempt to overhaul first run leader Jean-Pierre Vidal and blew it on the bottom section, Baxter had his medal.

Vidal kept calm to take gold ahead of his compatriot Amiez.

"I skiied the best I could and it was unbelievable after the year I've had," said Baxter, who had dyed his whole head blue after his initial design incorporating the cross of St Andrew was removed because of the British Olympic Association warned it could be construed as a political statement.

"Two seconds is a lot to make up but in these snow conditions anything is possible. It was really rough but they only reverse the top 15 in the Olympics rather than the top 30, and that was to my advantage.

"I've struggled this year but I've always had the belief. I came here knowing that if I had two perfect runs I could come away with a medal, and that's what I did."

Baxter had entered the current World Cup season ranked 11 but placed a best of 15th in eight races so far, failing to finish one and not even qualifying for two.

He even had to be content with third in the National Championships, and his ranking plunged to 28th.

On the eve of the Games Baxter, whose parents Iain and Sue were both British team members, pulled out of the giant slalom because a knee injury he suffered in pre-Games training.

Baxter added: "I just felt I had to give it everything or there would be no point in even starting. I wasn't really nervous. It came up a bit quick and I was kind of late for my start."

Trailing behind the man they used to call 'Biddy' at school but now give the altogether more fitting moniker of 'The Highlander', the slalom glamour boys were left to rue their missed opportunities.

Miller shrugged off his misfortune, saying: "It was going well and going out of the start I felt good. It was a great course and it was tough, you had to ski really well to make it down.

"If you wanted to make up time you had to be charging, and that was the plan. That's slalom for you."

Aamodt said: "I made a very big mistake on the top and that cost me a medal. It is very disappointing. The course was in very bad condition for the second run."

Baxter, who has the run of the Cairngorm Ski Club's slopes in Scotland but spends large chunks of his training year in Austria and France, had missed a gate and failed to finish in his first Winter Games in Nagano four years ago.

But a run of good World Cup performances, including a fourth at the 2001 finals in Sweden which ranked as Britain's best in the competition since Conrad Bartelski finished second in a downhill in December 1981, had marked him out as potentially one of Britain's best.

On Saturday the 10-time national champion came from nowhere to justify the hype.

An Olympic bronze medal hangs around the neck of the man who has proved to British athletes that the cold slushy white stuff is perhaps not such a bad thing after all.