Story highlights
Marcel Hirscher wins Alta Badia GS
Fourth at Italian Dolomites resort
Matches great Alberto Tomba
Lara Gut takes Val D'Isere super-G
Marcel Hirscher matched skiing legend Alberto Tomba by claiming his fourth World Cup giant slalom victory at Alta Badia in the Italian Dolomites Sunday.
Hirscher made it an excellent weekend for Austria after Max Franz’s surprise downhill success at nearby Val Gardena to extend his overall World Cup lead.
His Alta Badia triumphs have come in successive years from 2012, while Italy’s Tomba took his wins on the Gran Risa course in 1987, 1990, 1991 and 1994.
Hirscher extended his first leg lead to beat Frenchman Mathieu Faivre by 0.71 seconds with home hope Florian Eisath in third place.
Faivre’s highly-rated compatriot Alexis Pinturault crashed out on the second run, while Olympic champion Ted Ligety of the United States slid out on the first leg, still hampered by a back injury.
It was Hirscher’s first win in giant slalom this season after three runner-up spots and he was more pleased to have seen off the emergent French challenge in the discipline than records.
“I am super happy with my win today,” he told the official FIS website.
“The French team is setting the benchmark at the moment and we have been working to get closer to them,” he added.
And of his record breaking exploits at Alta Badia, including a slalom victory at the resort in 2011?
“At the moment I don’t care about records, but I’m sure in the future I will be proud,” he said.
The convincing victory has left Hirscher with a 218-point lead over Kjetil Jansrud of Norway in the overall standings, with a night time parallel giant slalom at Alta Badia Monday.
Gut closes on Shiffrin
In women’s World Cup action Sunday, Swiss Lara Gut shrugged off the disappointment of failing to finish in combined and downhill events at Val D’Isere the last two days to claim victory in a super-G.
Looking to close the gap on the absent Mikaela Shiffrin in the overall standings, reigning overall champion Gut finally secured winning points to relegate Tina Weirather of Liechtenstein to second place with Italian Elena Curtoni in third.
It has cut the gap on Shiffrin to five points, with the pair set to compete against each other at Courchevel on Tuesday in giant slalom.
Ilka Stuhec of Slovenia, looking for a hat-trick of victories at the French resort, finished a disappointing seventh.
