THE OLYMPICS / WINTER GAMES AT ALBERTVILLE : NOTES : Parisien Couldn’t Get the Big Break

Julie Parisien, who skied in Thursday’s slalom at Meribel with a cast on her broken wrist, refused to blame the injury for her losing the first-run lead and finishing fourth--but she said it didn’t help.

“At the start, I wasn’t able to bend over and buckle my boots,” she said. “It affected little things like that, making me lose some of my concentration. And in the race, sometimes I couldn’t plant a pole the way I normally would. I’d have to reach back awkwardly, and this might have cost me a little time.

“But I did OK in the first run. I just didn’t realize that this is the Olympics, and to win the gold medal, you’ve got to attack all the way in both runs, never let up.”

Parisien, 20, of Auburn, Me., said the time between runs was “just about the longest three hours of my life.”

She added: “I couldn’t eat lunch, there were too many butterflies in my stomach. And I just kept seeing medals in my head--gold, silver, bronze--which one would it be.”