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Lindsey Vonn wins ninth race of her career |
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Friday, 28 December 2007 |
 In Saturday's super combi, Mammoth's own Stacey Cook took 5th place in the downhill and 12th in the slalom, for a combined finish of 13th place.USST PHOTO
The podium was a North American "sandwich." Vonn's seventh downhill win came in a time of 1:32.00. Second place over the 2.2K course went to Kelly VanderBeek of Canada in 1:32.36 and Mancuso, surviving a near-spill at the bottom, finished in 1:32.38. Libby Ludlow (Bellevue, Wash.) finished 25th for her best World Cup downhill result in four years.
Early in her career, when she raced as Lindsey Kildow, Street was her idol and they remain good friends. Street won nine DHs in her glittering career; Vonn also has nine wins, including seven in DH, two in super G.
The victory extended Vonn's discipline points lead. After four downhills, she has 330 points to 224 for Canadian Britt Janyk, who won Dec. 8 at the Audi Aspen Winternational in Colorado. Vonn also moved into fourth place overall behind defending World Cup champion Nicole Hosp of Austria, who took over the lead from Sweden's Anja Paerson. Mancuso moved into sixth overall.
The 2001 FIS Alpine World Ski Championships were held in snowy St. Anton, but the men and women raced on different courses. Friday, the women tackled the men's DH run.
"If you keep fighting, you can find success!"
Vonn led the second training run after being fourth in the first training, but said she struggled at the start of the run, although she had the fastest first split time; however, Vonn regrouped as she came through the bottom section.
"I don't know what happened at the top, just screwy mistakes, but then I was all over the place in the middle...caught an edge, a little bobble, did some funny stuff. It was a crazy ride. I was out of control the whole way.
"I knew the bottom section was critical and where you could win or lose it," she said. "It just shows that if you keep fighting and you're determined, you can find success.
"It was a pretty difficult course, and it kind of reminded me of Aspen. You never can stay in your tuck, you're always going, going over a roll or something else...no big jumps, but there's a lot of drama, a lot of activity."
It was a little reminiscent of her silver-medal performance at the 2007 Worlds last February in Are, Sweden. She had a mid-race bobble and "turned my brain off" to shred the bottom of the run and collect her second silver medal of the World Championships.
"Yeah, exactly. That's it, just like Are. This was weird, too—just a wild ride. I mean, who knows, if I hadn't had that mistake up top, hadn't had those problems, would I have pushed it as I did at the bottom? I'm sure I would've skied well, but would I have won? Who knows? You don't know if that mistake pushes you harder," Vonn said.
"This one demands everything"
She praised the decision to stage the race on the men's course because that is more challenging than the women's run. "It's a very technical course and I would love to see more of these on the World Cup circuit. Many [women's] hills are just too easy, but this one demands everything of the racers," Vonn said.
Women's DH Coach Alex Hoedlmoser said the two-time Olympian could sense she was off the pace "and she was on the edge all the way to the bottom. It was an awesome run, especially with her trouble at the top."
He liked the way Vonn carried her training run aggressiveness into the race. "Lindsey brought it all over, all of it, and was completely on the edge because she knew she needed to make up time. She had a big mistake in the middle part and everybody thought 'That's it. It's over for Lindsey,' but she was full-on at the bottom.
"This is a very challenging run, intimidating and challenging and fast. There's a lot of terrain. Lindsey had just an awesome run, and Jules was awesome, too. She was on edge and at the bottom she made a great save to keep it together. She held on and barely made it past the wickets [gates]...just totally kept it going somehow," he said.
By the time Ludlow skied, at No. 43, the light was difficult, he said, "and she laid down a beautiful run. It's good to see her putting it down like that." -USST
With 10th victory, Vonn tops World Cup standings
ST. ANTON, Austria – Lindsey Vonn (Vail, Colo.) took over as World Cup points leader and passed childhood idol Picabo Street as she won a World Cup super combined Saturday, Dec. 22, for her second World Cup victory in 24 hours, the 10th of her career. Julia Mancuso (Olympic Valley, Calif.) was third for the second day in a row.
Her teammates lifted Vonn onto their shoulders in the finish area to mark the historic moment, the first time an American woman has won two races on back-to-back days since Tamara McKinney won a giant slalom and slalom March 10-11, 1984, at Waterville Valley, NH.
Vonn, who had won a downhill Friday, and Mancuso were 1-2 after the downhill portion of the "super combi." Mancuso was tied for second with defending champion and then-reigning World Cup points leader Nicole Hosp of Austria, but Hosp went out on her second run.
Vonn, who changed her name from Kildow in September after marrying 2002 Olympian Thomas Vonn, finished with a time of 2:20.28 for the downhill and one run of slalom. In second place was her close friend, Germany's Maria Riesch (2:20.91), who will host Vonn for the Christmas holidays.
Mancuso, with a bobble in the lower portion of the slalom, had the fourth-fastest SL run and finished in 2:20.93 for her third podium of the season.
"This is so great! I'm so happy to be on the podium, and to be on the podium with Maria and Julia...just so wonderful," Vonn said.
Vonn finds success at "the office"
After her downhill victory, Vonn laughingly said, "Well, I've got to go back to 'the office' tomorrow and do it all again." Then she did just that, building a 1.48-second lead in the downhill and posting the 10th-fastest slalom run.
After dominating the 2.2K downhill, she took fewer risks on the short, steep slalom hill. "I didn't take too many risks," she conceded.
She missed slalom training Friday because of the normal post-race press conference and other interviews, she said; however, teammate Stacey Cook (Mammoth Mountain, Calif.) filled her in on the course set by Chris Knight, U.S. women's slalom and GS head coach. When Hosp, Sweden's Anja Paerson and Austrian Marlies Schild, the defending World Cup slalom champ, went out in the SL, it left the door wide open for Vonn.
"With so many good racers out, I didn't have to take too many risks on my slalom run," Vonn said. "I decided to make it a smart race."
She refused to think about winning the overall title because it's so early in the World Cup schedule—and because the women won't be running speed races until late January. "It's fun to be leading the overall standings now, but the season is long. I like to be one of the main players, but Nicole Hosp is a remarkable skier in all the disciplines," she said.
Vonn: "My hard work is paying off"
One of her goals has been to win a super combined event. With that in mind, Vonn said she trained a lot of slalom and GS during the fall. "My hard work is paying off," she said.
After 12 races, Vonn has 474 points to 419 for Hosp. Riesch is third at 389. Mancuso sits in sixth place (364) with a podium in three different disciplines (super combined, DH and giant slalom). Vonn has seven World Cup triumphs in downhill, two in super G and now one in super combined.
Overall, she has 25 top-3s in her career. Among U.S. women, she is second to McKinney, who won 18 World Cup races.
Cook, who was fifth in the downhill, finished 13th while Resi Stiegler (Jackson Hole, Wyo.), 12th in the downhill stage, failed to finish the slalom.
Temperatures were in the mid-30s under a clear sky.
"It was another unbelievable day. They all were charging, right from the start of the downhill," Head Coach Patrick Riml said. "What Lindsey did is unreal; she dominated the downhill again and then she and Julia really did a good job in slalom. They haven't had much slalom training in the last couple of weeks because of the speed races, so this was excellent." Two weeks ago, they had a down in the Audi Aspen Winternational in Colorado and last week, the women had a downhill and super G in St. Moritz, Switzerland.
The DH was over the same course the women skied Friday, but Riml said that challenge for the slalom skiers was balanced "because the slalom course is so steep. It starts with a steep pitch, has some side hill, some more steep and then down to the finish. They're both very tough courses."
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Last Updated ( Friday, 04 January 2008 )
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