Swiss ski star Marco Odermatt finally wins 1st career World Cup downhill
Marco Odermatt finally won a World Cup downhill Thursday in his 36th attempt, after eight previous second-place finishes.
The Swiss star, who has 29 World Cup wins in giant slalom and super-G, was close to flawless in ideal racing conditions on his home nation’s signature downhill track to be 0.58 seconds faster than Cyprien Sarrazin. Aleksander Aamodt Kilde was third, trailing 0.81 behind his long-time rival.
“It’s a dream, finally, my first win in downhill and here at home,” Odermatt told Swiss broadcaster RTS. “I was very motivated for today. I skied with lots of risk.”
Odermatt took gold in downhill at the world championships last season yet had eight runner-up results — including twice at Wengen beaten by Kilde — and three third places without a win in the marquee discipline on the World Cup circuit.
His 30th career World Cup race win, and his sixth this season, followed 18 in giant slalom and 11 in super-G. He also won Olympic gold in giant slalom at Beijing in 2022.
Odermatt was set to earn 100 World Cup points which would extend the two-time defending overall champion’s lead in the standings to 372 points ahead of Marco Schwarz, whose season was ended by a crash in downhill last month at Bormio, Italy. Kilde, the 2020 overall champion, is third.
The top three placings Thursday mirrored the season-long downhill standings, which Kilde won for the past two seasons.
Cameron Alexander of North Vancouver, B.C., was the top Canadian in 24th place.
Replaces Beaver Creek event
The extra downhill race on the storied Lauberhorn hill beneath the Eiger and Jungfrau mountains replaced a race cancelled because of poor weather last month at Beaver Creek, Colo.
It used a shortened 2.95-kilometre course starting just above the signature Hundschopf cliff-face jump that launched racers up to 40 metres through the air.
Odermatt excelled by being fast through the tricky S-shaped bends midway through the course where racer speeds dip to about 70 kph.
“I made a few little errors and Marco did a perfect run, I think,” acknowledged Sarrazin, who got his first win in Bormio two weeks ago.
Odermatt’s top speed on the later Hanneggschuss straight was close to 142 kph. Fifth-placed Dominik Paris topped 145 kph on the section where Johan Clarey set a World Cup speed record in 2013 of 161.9 kph.
Kilde had been sick this week and said he “felt like my head was a little bit in the slo-mo sometimes. I felt like I couldn’t work with the jumps.”
The extended four-race weekend at Wengen continues Friday with a super-G before the classic Lauberhorn downhill on Saturday that is the longest race on the World Cup circuit. The full distance of about 4.4 kilometres takes close to 2-½ minutes to complete.
