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BAD KLEINKIRCHHEIM
Mancuso again led 10 U.S. starters in eighth place while
Vonn recorded her lowest finish in a World Cup super G since
2006 in 18th ( 39 starts). “I felt OK in the start, but I didn’t really have the self-confidence and the power that I normally
have,” said Vonn, who hadn’t missed a super G podium in
her last 19 races. “I’m still not myself. I’m just going to try to
rest up the next couple days and hopefully get a day of training in before Cortina and try to get my form back for the next
races. I definitely struggled this weekend, but I’m not going to
put too much weight in it. For me it’s easy to overanalyze and
say why did this happen. I know it’s because I was sick and
I’m just going to accept that and move forward and try to ski
aggressively in Cortina.”
Laurenne Ross made another step back toward her usual
confident self in 14th place. “I didn’t really have ski racing in
my mind anymore, I went through a really hard time trying to
get back, just to get back into my skis and get my head back
to wanting to get back on my skis was hard,” said Ross after
the super G. “Yesterday was a really big jump for me; just going down the downhill course was a really huge thing.”
Ross said she came in with a little more confidence because
she knew she could make it down and could still ski. “I came
in and I tried to push the line,” she said. “It’s been a really hard
month but I’m really happy to be back and I’m thrilled with this
weekend.”
Ross was followed closely by teammate Leanne Smith in
15th, her second-best finish of the season.
The surprise of the day came from German 20-year-old Ve-ronique Hronek, who came all the way from the No. 38 bib
to finish sixth for her best result ever. Her previous high was
scored just the day before in 17th.
Despite in her uncharacteristically low results, Vonn left Bad
Kleinkirchheim still in charge of the overall rankings with a
164-point lead on Austrian slalom champ Marlies Schild.
Off Piste Politics
After the first (and what would be the only) downhill training
run in Bad Kleinkirchheim, young Swiss star Lara Gut made a
proposal as the athletes’ representative to straighten out the
course set through the first few turns, but women’s World Cup
Chief Race Director Atle Skaardal declined the suggestion.
“This year the top 15 can talk to the FIS,” said Gut. “It’s not
so clear what we can say and what we can’t. But after the first
training run we were just thinking that it was so turny – it wasn’t
dangerous, but we thought maybe we could set the first part just
a little bit straighter, but they didn’t agree. I was talking to every
girl that I found at the finish line and everybody has that opinion.
So nobody told me, ‘No, it’s fine.’ So I tried but it didn’t work.”
Skaardal clarified that non-safety concerns with a course would
not be considered. “I think some of the athletes misunderstand
the task of the athletes’ representative,” he said. “I think the
athletes representative could be for safety issues — a jump is
too big, or soft snow. If the athletes’ representative is asking to
reset the course because she didn’t like to ski it as it is, that’s
not something I can take seriously.”
After the downhill, it was learned that Skaardal’s weekend was
made even more busy when the eventual winner, Austrian Elisa-
beth Goergl arrived late to inspect the course. Goergl received a
verbal warning from the jury for being tardy when she arrived af-
ter inspection was closed. Skaardal said that she was informed
that the next time she’s late, she will be given a monetary fine.
“In speed events we would never in any case deny a racer ac-
cess to the course,” said Skaardal. “I don’t want a racer hanging
upside down in the safety nets and I have to tell everybody that
I denied anybody an inspection because they were late by two
minutes.”
