Austrian double victory by a hundredth of a second in a super-G thriller
This super-G on the Saslong was not for the faint-hearted. In an exhilarating race with extremely close time gaps, Austrian Vincent Kriechmayr found the fastest line, securing victory by a wafer-thin margin just ahead of his teammate Daniel Hemetsberger.
Kriechmayr came out on top in the first super-G of this winter with a time of 1:28.39 minutes. This is the Upper Austrian's third triumph in Val Gardena/Gröden, having already won a super-G at the foot of the Sassolungo/Langkofel in 2019 and a downhill in 2022. Behind Kriechmayr, Daniel Hemetsberger completed the Austrian double victory. The 32-year-old missed out on his first World Cup victory by just two hundredths of a second.
All-rounder Marco Odermatt from Switzerland completed the podium in third place. The overall World Cup leader, who was unbeatable in the last four super-Gs in the World Cup, finished just three hundredths behind the day's winner, Kriechmayr. Cyprien Sarrazin (France / 4th place), Marco Schwarz (Austria / 5th place), and James Crawford (Canada / 6th place) all kept their gap below two-tenths of a second - but that was not enough to finish in the top three.
Two Italians in the top ten
Two "Azzurri", Mattia Casse and Guglielmo Bosca, were also impressed by Vincent Kriechmayr's victory. Casse finished eighth (+0.29), while Bosca only just missed out on the best result of his World Cup career in tenth place. One of the big losers on Friday was the top favorite Aleksander Aamodt Kilde. The five-time Saslong triumphant lost a lot of time without making any visible mistakes and had to settle for 37th place.
This left the 2020 and 2021 super-G winner without any World Cup points. Just like Kilde, South Tyrol's speed specialists also had a disappointing day: Florian Schieder from Castelrotto finished in 37th place, tying with Kilde, veteran Christof Innerhofer from Gais was 50th, and Dominik Paris from Ultimo (55th) had low chances as a "test pilot" with the low starting bib 2.
On Saturday, the downhill classic will be the highlight of the 56th Saslong Classic. The race starts at 11:45 am.
The complete results list for the super-G can be found here.
