Are: Hosp overtakes Mancuso for Austria's 1st gold       
By Sam Flickinger    
Tuesday, 13 February 2007 
skiracing.com

ARE, Sweden — Nicole Hosp of Austria won her country's first gold medal 11 days into the 2007 alpine World Championships, scorching the second run to overtake leader Julia Mancuso. Mancuso, who led the first run, struggled in the second run and fell to fifth, out of the medals. The good times continued for host country Sweden, with Maria Pietilae-Holmner taking silver and Italy's Denise Karbon bronze.
    “The snow wasn’t what I expected. It was a lot rougher, and kind of unforgiving,” Mancuso said. “I didn’t have the timing right. … I just had to go out and ski. I was a littler bit tired.”
    Was Mancuso aware of how stellar a run the Austrian had thrown down?
    “No,” Mancuso said. “I just had to go out and ski my best.”
    Tied for fourth after the first run, Hosp, the giant slalom World Cup points leader, won with a combined time of 2 minutes, 31.72 seconds. Pietilae-Holmner was .85 back and Karbon .97 back. Austrian Michaela Kirchgasser finished fourth, Mancuso fifth, German Kathrin Hoelzl sixth and Swede Anna Ottosson seventh.
   
It is the fifth World Championships medal for Hosp, who took bronze in the downhill last week. She took silver in combined at the 2003 worlds and in the team event in 2005 and bronze in slalom in 2003.
    American Libby Ludlow was 29th, with Resi Stiegler 35th and Jessica Kelley 36th.
    ''I dreamt of this gold medal last night,'' Hosp said. ''I heard there were some bad jokes going around, that the Austrians cannot make a gold medal. And now it's time for the gold medal for Austria. I think a lot of people at home are very happy about it.''
    Pietilae-Holmner was sixth after the opening run but had a similarly stunning second trip down the slope for an aggregate time of 2:32.57.
    Until Tuesday, Austria had two silver and three bronze medals.
    ''Niki had a perfect run,'' Austria's alpine director Hans Pum said. ''Everybody was asking when we were going to win our first gold. It was a lot of pressure for the whole team. But now we have the gold medal.''   
    Anja Paerson, who had won the first three events at these championships and became the first skier with world titles in all five disciplines when she won Sunday's downhill, crashed in the second leg. She was seventh in the first leg.
    Paerson had a chance to become the first woman to win four golds at the same worlds. Leading halfway down the course in the second run, however, Paerson caught an inside ski and crashed, gliding down the course on her belly.
    ''Of course I'm very disappointed," she said. "I tried to push myself to go fast and go for the gold and not hold back anywhere. You only have a World Championships at home once, and you can't go home feeling you didn't give it your all.''
    Following her crash, Paerson got back up and continued down to the finish to wave and smile at the home crowd, but said she wasn't as happy as she looked.
    ''Of course not. I just look that way for you guys,'' she said. ''It would have been one thing if I wasn't even close, but in the second run I skied extremely well up there, and I think it would have been extremely tight at the finish. Maybe I wouldn't have beaten Hosp, but I think I would have gotten a medal.''
    Unheralded 20-year-old Pietilae-Holmner, last year's world juniors slalom champ, was just sixth after the first leg. She said she received some valuable advice from Paerson while she was talking to teammate Ottosson ahead of the second run.
    ''Anja came over and said 'It's only medals that count,' and that gave me something to think about,'' Pietilae-Holmner said. ''I said to myself to view it as a first run, and not think about the fact that I was in sixth place.''
    Italy's Karbon, who switched to Fischer skis last summer, moved up from 12th after the first run. ''I thought the medals was going to be fought out by the skiers in front of me,'' she said. ''I liked the second run much more. It was much tighter. It suited my characteristics much better. I believed until the end."
    She suffered major torn ligaments in her knee in 2004. "The gates were more narrow and I could really relax," she said of the second run. "I was disappointed by my first run so I had nothing to lose. I just attacked. I am surprised but just so happy to achieve this performance. ... I've been coming back a long time from my injuries."  
    Paerson still has a chance for a fourth gold, as she remains one of the favorites for the slalom on Friday. ''Anything can happen,'' she said. ''It feels like I have a lot of energy left in my body. I don't feel very worn today after the giant slalom, so that bodes well for the slalom.''
— Don Cameron, Whitney Childers and The Associated Press contributed to this report