Hirscher wins title with one race to go
KRANJSKA GORA, SLOVENIA» Marcel Hirscher locked up the men’s World Cup giant slalom title Saturday with a race to spare, underlining his ongoing dominance of the discipline.
The Olympic GS champion from Austria won the penultimate event of the season for his 56th career victory, giving him an insurmountable 125-point lead in the GS standings over Norwegian rival Henrik Kristoffersen. A victory is worth 100 points.
Hirscher did so in style, posting the fastest times in both runs. He finished in 2 minutes, 20.76 seconds, beating runner-up Kristoffersen by 1.66 seconds. Alexis Pinturault of France was more than 2½ seconds off the pace in third.
“I am very happy that it happened today,” said the Austrian star, adding that he wasn’t expecting to wrap up the title Saturday, one day after he turned 29.
“To me, this comes as a little bit as a surprise as I haven’t been thinking about it. I was just thinking about the race. Normally you would need the calculator only in two weeks’ time,” he said, referring to the World Cup finals in Are, Sweden.
Hirscher’s win Saturday was no surprise.
The veteran alpine ski racer has won eight of the past 10 World Cup giant slaloms and reached the podium of the other two. The last time he failed to finish in the top three was when he placed fifth at the season-ending GS in 2016.