It was a masterful performance on ski racing's one of most demanding courses - one that will be talked about for years to come. Yet for World Cup skiing's fastest rising star, Carlo Janka of Switzerland, it almost seemed like it was just business as usual.

Janka, who earned the nickname "The Iceman" for his cool and calm demeanor, dominated on the 4465-meter racecourse Saturday, destroying the field and winning the heralded Lauberhorn downhill by 0.66 seconds. Not a small margin by any means. His winning time on the tour's longest downhill was 2:32.23.

"It's so fantastic to win here in the home country," said Janka in the finish area while fans chanted his name. "It's a dream for every Swiss downhiller to win here once. I'm 23 years old and you need a lot of experience to win here. It's unbelievable."

Janka's margin of victory of almost seven-tenths of a second was the largest in the Wengen downhill since Austria's Stephan Eberharter won by more than a second in 2003. The young Swiss sensation got faster, increasing his lead at every time interval. At the last, he was .92 ahead before winning by the substantial .66 margin.

"I think the Brueggli-S (now called the Kernen-S) was the place where I skied the best and made up time," said Janka. I had a lot of speed there and that's where I made up the most time on the other guys."

Canada's Manuel Osborne-Paradis was the nearest racer to Janka, finishing 0.66 seconds behind. The Vancouver native has skied well in Wengen over the past few seasons finishing third in 2008 and fifth last year.

"I like this course just because of the crowd," said Osborne-Paradis. "It's long, but it's frightening and you can attack everywhere. There's the Brueggli-S (a tight, technical series of turns halfway down the course), it looks great on TV, it's fast, it's got some turns. It's everything you could ask for in a downhill."

38-year-old Marco Buechel of Liechtenstein had a superb run, making his way onto the podium in third place, 0.82 off Janka's pace. For the veteran racer who has been attacking downhills since the '92 Olympics in Albertville, it was his best-ever result at the Lauberhorn.

"I was so tired and I tried to stay on my feet," said Buechel about crossing the finish line in first place, collapsing to the snow and then saluting the crowd. "I turned around and saw the crowd going wild. So much joy in my heart - this is the moment I've dreamed of. I tried to soak it up, soak it up. I was lieing in the snow, looked up at the sky and thought dreams can come true."

Buechel left the starthouse ninth and remained in the lead until Osborne-Paradis came down seven racers later. It was a wild ride in the leader's area for Buechel, as Italy's Werner Heel barely missed moving into the lead by .01 and Slovenia's Andrej Jerman by .04.

American Bode Miller also seemed like he would overtake Buechel as he was .25 seconds ahead at the final split time. However, he appeared to run out of gas, losing an edge and going down in the finishing S-curve.

"I had the right amount of luck today - I skied good, but I also had luck," said Buechel about the podium finish. "Sometimes you have luck, sometimes you don't. Today, I gave my best and had luck."

A record attendance of 32,000 fans, many of them proudly waving Swiss fans witnessed Janka's impressive victory. While Janka was on the victory stand, those at the finish chanted his name in unison.

"It's a lot of tradition here," said Janka. "It's a special place. You can only come here by train. I like it here, it's a nice place and a nice part of Switzerland."

"I don't know how someone can win the Lauberhorn and not go crazy in the finish area," joked Marco Buechel about Janka. "He's one of the best skiers I've ever seen, he trains hard and he's really got the whole package."

With the victory, Janka moved past Austria's Benjamin Raich in the overall World Cup standings. The Swiss racer now leads the Austrian, 757 to 689.

"We will see at the end of the season," said Janka when asked if we could win this season's overall title. "He has a chance to take it back in (tomorrow's) slalom. I'll be watching it on TV."

Well deserved.

By Brian Pinelli
FISalpine.com
Saturday 16 January 2010

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