Recent FIS News

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Alpine: World Cup finals well underway

Aksel Lund Svindal put his mark on the final World Cup downhill of the season, making the race in Schladming – the last of 2011-12 – his best of the season in notching his first win, more than a half a second ahead of Beat Feuz as Austrian Hannes Reichelt drew a loud roar from the crowd coming in third. With a time of 1 minute, 46.81 seconds, Svindal left the second and third ranked skiers respectively 0.57 and 0.67 seconds behind. The most raucous cheers however, came when Klaus Kroell – seventh in the race –  claimed the World Cup downhill title, finishing the season with 605 points as Beat Feuz was second with 598 and Didier Cuche – whose final career downhill race was a wild affair, including a near crash – ended up third in the final standings with 521 points.

Even though they were racing against each other this morning, Kroell has great respect for Cuche and will for sure miss having him on the Tour after he retires at the end of these Finals. “Didier is one of the biggest skiers over the last years and I wish him all the best in the upcoming years and in his life,” he said about Cuche’s retirement. Beat Feuz might not have stolen the title form Kroell today, but he was able to add 80 really important points to his Overall account. It also seems as if he was not really bothered by the fact that he missed the small globe by just seven points, he is focused on the “bigger picture”, in this case the Overall title.

Tomorrow the men will be competing in the last super G of the season and currently there are three names, which could clinch the title. With 413 points, Svindal is currently in the lead but Didier Cuche sits second, 42 points behind. After failing to say goodbye to his favorite discipline in the way he wanted, Cuche might have some extra motivation in tomorrow’s Super G race. Feuz showed he was one to watch on the new slope in Schladming and by sitting in third position, 45 points behind Svindal and 3 points behind Cuche he is more than capable of overtaking them for the title. With a 135 points lead in front of Hirscher in the Overall standings, he has a lot at stake and it will for sure be interesting to see with which globe in mind he will be skiing in tomorrow’s race.

Discipline title already in the bag, Lindsey wins last Downhill

Lindsey Vonn says she’s running low on energy, but you sure couldn’t tell by watching her charge another downhill course in Schladming Wednesday at the last of the 2011-2012 Audi FIS World Cup season.

The victory was her 12^th of the season, and reinforces her fifth straight downhill title  that she secured weeks ago. The American champion – who also already secured the ladies overall Cup title – crossed the finish line of the 2013 World Championships course in 1 minute, 46.56 seconds, leaving everyone more than a second behind her except for Marion Rolland of France, who earned her first career World Cup podium in second place, 0.92 seconds back. Tina Maze made her only downhill podium of the season in third, 1.22 seconds back.

For Vonn, however, the work is never done. Notching 12 wins this season and thereby breaking her 2009 record of 11 in securing her fourth overall title (the only American skier to ever do so) and earning her fifth straight downhill title is quite a feat, but Vonn has another goal to reach. She is now up to 1908 points in the overall standings.

“I’m really trying hard to break Hermann Maier’s record,” referring to the Austrian icon who holds the World Cup’s season point record of 2,000 points. “I only have three races left this season. It was a huge step today.”

Thursday’s super G ladies final in Schladming will be an exciting one. Vonn leads the SG standings with 413 points and can only be beat by Anna Fenninger who is second in the standings with 319 points. Another win would take Vonn beyond the 2,000 points and surpass Maier’s record.

Contributed by Ana Jelusic and Shauna Farnell

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