Brignone flies all through the fog to claim 25th WCup win
KVITFJELL: Federica Brignone burst through the fog to win the second super-G in Kvitfjell on Sunday ahead of Lara Gut-Behrami, who picked up precious points in the race for the big globe. Despite skiing when visibility was at its worst Brignone beat the overall leader by 0.61 seconds with the Czech Ester Ledecka rounding out the podium 0.79sec behind the winner.
It marked a 25th World Cup win for the 33-year-old Italian, her fourth this season. “For sure it’s a weird race, it was a hard day for all the girls,” said Brignone after an event which was constantly halted because of the fog and took two and a half hours for the first 30 skiers to compete, making the race official.
“I’m usually good when the start is moved or where there is some waiting and when there is no visibility,” said Brignone. “I was not seeing really good but I had everything in my mind and I was just focusing on my skiing and what I had to do.”
After finishing sixth the day before in the first super-G, which was initially intended to be a downhill, the Italian has skied herself back into contention for one of the big prizes. She is now second in the race for the big globe, 326 points behind Gut-Behrami and lies third in the discipline standings, 74 points behind the Swiss and five points behind the Austrian Cornelia Huetter.
The real winner of the weekend, though, was Gut-Behrami, who won the first super-G on Saturday and looks odds-on to claim her second crystal globe. “I’m happy about the way I skied,” she said. “Also in these conditions where it’s soft, I’m not usually the best skier in those conditions.”
Not only does Gut-Behrami hold a sizeable lead over Brignone but she is 385-points ahead of Mikaela Shiffrin who is expected to return from injury next week in Are (Sweden), where a giant and a slalom are scheduled, before the finals from in Saalbach, Austria from March 16 to 23.
There was disappointment, however, for local favourite Ragnhild Mowinckel, who announced earlier in the week that she would retire at the end of the season. The 31-year-old Norwegian was hoping for a good show in her final outing on home snow but the the double Olympic medallist and four-time World Cup winner could only finish 10th. — AFP