The Sportspedia
Several sports pause their activities during the New Year but that is not the case in Winter Sports, obviously. Here we recap this weekend in winter sports.
Alpine Skiing:
There were three FIS Alpine World Cups this week:
World Cup Bormio
On December 29 and 30 Bormio (Italy) hosted its usual Super G and Downhill Men’s World Cups. In Super G, Ryan Cochan-Siegle became the first US American since Bode Miller to win a Super G World Cup race. He was followed by Vicent Kriechmayr (AUT) and Adrian Smiseth Sejersted (NOR).
Mathias Mayer (AUT) won the closest race of the season in Downhill, edging Vincent Kriechmayr (AUT) by 0.04 seconds and Urs Kryenbühl (SUI) by 0.06 in a very exciting race.
World Cup Semmering
Semmering (Austria) should have hosted a Slalom and Giant Slalom but the GS was cancelled due to to unfavorable meteorological conditions.
Michelle Gisin (SUI) became the first Swiss to win a Slalom World Cup race in 19 seasons. She defeated Katharina Liensberger (AUT) and Mikaela Shiffrin (USA), who scored her 99th podium. World Cup leader Petra Vlhová (SVK) finished fourth.
World Cup Zagreb
Petra Vlhová (SVK) did win this time, taking the third Slalom out of four this season at the “Snow Queen” World Cup. Katharina Liensberger (AUT) took another second and Michelle Gisin (SUI) closed a strong week with another podium.
Cross-Country Skiing
FIS World Cup – Tour de Ski
Norway withdrew the Tour de Ski World Cup races, meaning unfortunately we are not able to see the strongest team and some athletes such as Johannes Høsflot Klæbo and Therese Johaug, who might have been the favorites to win this year, after taking the Nordic Opening.
Nevertheless the defending Men’s Champion is competing and so far he is dominating. Alexander Bolshunov (RUS) took the lead of the FIS World Cup and the Tour de Ski by placing 2nd at the Sprint Freestyle, behind Federico Pellegrino (ITA), and then taking the 15 km C Mass Start and the 15 km F Pursuit, with different Skiers taking the podium places.
Linn Svahn (SWE) had an impressive start by winning the first two races: the Sprint Freestyle and the 10 km C Mass Start. But so far it is a US American 1-2 because Jessie Diggins (USA) and Rosie Brennan (USA) made a 1-2 in the 10 km F Pursuit, which also give them that position Overall. Diggins had been third in the previous races. Svahn is sixth, and the Points leader.
Luge:
FIL Luge World Cup
The news were that Germany did not win everything and that Felix Loch (DEU) is a human that can make mistakes.
The Austrian team won the Team Relay at Konigsee with Madeleine Egle, Nico Gleitscher and the doubles Thomas Steu and Lorenz Koller, who beat Germany by two tenths. The Doubles team of Toni Eggert/Sascha Benecken, and Julia Taubitz were the fastest of their categories within the relay but Loch was only fourth due to a mistake, so Germany had to settle for silver, over Russia.
The rest was gold for the local team. Julia Taubitz won her fifth race of the season. She has always beat Natalie Geisenberger (DEU) for the win but Geisenberger leads the World Cup with a total of seven second places in seven races. For Taubitz it was her 9th World Cup win, 5th in Singles.
Tony Eggert and Sascha Benecken (DEU) continued their rivalry against Tobias Wendl and Tobias Arlt (DEU) for being the most successful World Cup Lubes double team of all time, and they won this time, for their third win this season.
And while Loch did not have a great Team run, he keeps on dominating the Singles circuit with his sixth race win out of seven attempts. Olympic Champion, David Gleirscher (AUT), crashed out in the first run.
Ski Jumping:
FIS World Cup – 69th Four Hills Tournament
Three hills have had three different winners. Karl Geiger (DEU), the Ski Flying World Champion, won the first competition, at Oberstdorf (Germany) with a total of 291.1 but then he finished fifth at Garmisch-Partenkirchen (Germany) and a disappointing 16th at Innsbruck (Austria).
Halvor Egner Granerud (NOR), winner of five consecutive World Cups before this tournament, finished 2nd and 4th to lead the competition after two hills but also had a very disappointing Innsbruck, where he finished 15th.
So the leaders are two Polish skiers. First is Kamil Stoch (POL), who won today in Innsbruck and has previously finished second and fourth. Second is Dawid Kubacki (POL), who has finished 15th, 1st and 3rd. They are followed by Granerud, Geiger and Markus Eisenbichler (DEU), winner of the first two World Cups this season.
Bischofshofen (Austria) defines the tournament in Wednesday.
