ALPINE SKI. LIENZ, Austria – Marlies Schild emphatically insists that “it is never easy to win,” but in winning her fourth World Cup slalom race of the season – her third in Lienz and the 31st of her career – she certainly made it look easy on Thursday.

“It was very difficult,” she said after the race. “The second run, the setting was not so easy. You really had to work from the start to the finish. It was a long course.”

It’s true that the Austrian never expects to win, as evidenced during the first run Thursday,  when she stood in the leader’s box earnestly watching all the ensuing racers come down, waiting for someone to post a faster time.

But once again, nobody did. Establishing an early lead in the first run, the four-time World Cup slalom champion won the race in a combined time of 1 minute, 51.42 seconds.

Charging to her second straight slalom podium, Tina Maze came in second, 0.79 seconds back, but the big story of the day is that of 16-year-old American Mikaela Shiffrin, who, after just starting to race on the World Cup this season, landed her first career podium in third, 1.30 seconds off the winning time and posting the fastest second run time (56.56).

“It’s a very good way to end the year,” said Schild of her final victory of 2011. “It’s nice to win at home. It’s amazing it always works out so well.”

As is her way, Schild marked her territory early, leading Maze by 0.54 seconds going into the second run with a handful of others trailing by under a second.

The Swiss course setting in the second run proved tricky for several racers, but not for Slovakia’s Veronika Zuzulova, who started 11th and posted the second fastest second-run time after Shiffrin, and spent a considerable amount of time standing in the leader’s box, finishing eighth. In spite of being the 40th athlete to start on Thursday, Shiffrin, who posted an astonishing eighth-place result in the Aspen slalom, finished 12th in the first run. After her lightning fast second run, the teenager stood in the leader’s box for several minutes taking deep breaths and scarcely believing her success until she was mobbed by her teammates when it became clear that she had made the podium.

“I’ve been working for this almost my whole life,” said Shiffrin, who hails, like teammate Sarah Schleper who retired from the World Cup on Thursday (stay tuned for that story), from Vail, Colorado. “I’ve been watching all these girls – Marlies Schild, Kathrin Zettel, Lindsey Vonn, Nicole Hosp … I’ve been watching the top girls for the past 10 years, cheering them on, learning from their success. Now I’m here … and it feels really crazy.”

Only Maze – the only racer finishing within a second of Schild’s winning time – and then the slalom queen herself, could usurp Shiffrin’s speed.

“She’s an idol for me,” Shiffrin said of Schild. “All these racers are. Standing next to her  and Tina Maze on the podium was a dream come true.”

As for Maze, who finished third in the World Cup standings last season behind Maria Hoefl-Riesch and Lindsey Vonn, she said it sometimes takes her engine a little while to warm up at the beginning of the season. She agreed that she’s off to a good start in the tight gates, with her only two podiums so far coming in slalom.

“The start of the season was not how I wanted,” said Maze, who won giant slalom gold in the world championships last year and silver in super-combined and won the last slalom race of the season – her first on the World Cup. “It’s a little hard for me to find rhythm at the start of the season. My machine is a little bit diesel.”

By the look of Maze on Thursday, the diesel is doing just fine accelerating at this point. Several others in the race zapped their forward movement in the second run. Christina Geiger was not among them, however. After two strong runs, the German took fourth place, just 0.03 seconds off the podium and Kathrin Zettel had a very fast second run to take fifth in 1:52.86. Manuela Moelgg also posted two strong runs to finish sixth (1:53:15) and Maria Pietilae-Holmner turned up the gas in the second run to take seventh (1:53.21). After speedy Zuzulova, Maria Hoefl-Riesch lost her first-run speed and the chance to land on the podium by getting jostled a bit in run No. 2 and slipping to ninth place. Lindsey Vonn was one of the handful of ladies to trail Schild by less than a second after the first run but hit a hole in the second run, scrubbing the lead she had on the top of the course and finishing 18th.

by Shauna Farnell
FISalpine.com
Thursday 29 December 2011