ALPINE SKI WORLD CUP. Soelden, Austria – The 2012/2013 season kicks off with an exciting first run for the ladies, Tina Maze is in the lead with a time of 1 minute 11.95 seconds. The Slovenian skier put down a smooth run, leaving second ranked Tessa Worley over half a second behind. The young French skier, who finished third last season in the Giant Slalom rankings wasn’t able to keep up with Maze’s pace. Viktoria Rebensburg, last year’s GS Cup winner currently sits in third, just over a second behind the leader.

Tina Maze (SLO), photo © FIS

After a week of clear blue skies and perfect conditions, Friday night the weather took a turn for the worse in Soelden forcing organizers to start working on the slope preparation at 4am on Saturday. The hard work sure paid off as the ladies' race was able to start on time and the slope had been cleared from the nights’ snowfall. The base seemed to be holding really well, giving an opportunity to ladies outside of the top 15 to make their way towards the top of the ranks. Kathrin Zettelfrom Austria is currently in fourth, 1.59 seconds behind Maze, uprising Canadian skier Marie-Michelle Gagnon had an outstanding run which put her in ninth place from bib number 24, so did Dominique Gisin, the speed specialist from Switzerland – she gained 18 places, going from bib 28 into 10th position.

Today’s surprise run came from Simona Hoesel from Germany who is the only one starting outside the top 30 (bib 35) who made it into the top 15, she is currently 13th , 2.57 seconds off the leader’s time. Julia Mancuso and Lara Gut, two of the top contenders for one of the high spots in today’s race were not as fortunate and wer unable to finish the race.

So far, the weather is still being cooperative, making everyone on site very happy and we are looking forward to watching the race develop in the second run which kicks off at 12.45 CET.

Stay tuned!

by Ana Jelusic
FISalpine.com
Saturday 27 October 2012