Canadian skier Grenier takes rain‐marred World Cup GS for 2nd career win

Valerie Grenier has made a tri‐ umphant return to the resort of her first World Cup victory.

The Canadian skier won a giant slalom Saturday on the same hill in Slovenia where she celebrated her maiden career win a year ago.

"I'm not really sure why it seems to be a really good hill for me, and that last pitch is always one of my best parts," Grenier said. "I'm not really sure why it just seems to be fitting for me, but I will take it."

In the rain‐marred race, Mikaela Shiffrin finished in ninth position, nine days after the American won the previous GS in Austria.

Saturday's result was the American's worst in 15 giant slaloms since finishing 13th in Killington, Vermont, in Novem‐ ber 2022.

Looming in fourth, Grenier posted the best time in the sec‐ ond run on a course set by Cana‐ dian coach Pierre Miniotti and saw the three fastest racers from the opening leg all fail to beat her.

"I feel like I have no words. I am just so happy, so proud. It's crazy," Grenier said.

Last year, she became the first Canadian to win a women's World Cup giant slalom in 49 years. She ended the season with another GS podium at the World Cup finals in Soldeu, Andorra.

Grenier, who was the junior world champion in downhill in 2016, has no World Cup podiums in other disciplines.

Lara Gut‐Behrami came closest as the Swiss skier trailed Grenier by 0.37 seconds.

Federica Brignone was 0.51 back in third and the Italian re‐ mained in the lead of the GS sea‐ son standings.

"A podium is always satisfying," said Brignone, who won back‐to‐ back giant slaloms in Mont Tremblant, Quebec, in early De‐ cember. "For sure, today I feel like I didn't do my best … I was missing little things, especially in the second run, I couldn't attack as I wanted."

Petra Vlhova, who edged out Brignone by 0.02 to lead after the first run, dropped to fourth.

Grenier showed her strength in the opening run when she posted the fastest times in two of the four sections of the Podkoren course. However, she lost nearly three‐quarters of a second due to a mistake before entering the fin‐ ish pitch.

"After the first run I was pretty mad at myself for the mistake," said Grenier, adding she told her‐ self before the final run: "Now I wanted to win."

Shiffrin avoided major mis‐ takes in what seemed like a rather conservative first run as the world champion from the United States lost time on then‐ leader Vlhova at each checkpoint and finished 0.98 off the pace in seventh.