Pre Olympic GS Goes To Marcel Hirscher

The giant slalom is back on the World Cup Tour after a three week break and the specialists were eager to get back in race mode and offer a great show to the public of Garmisch-Partenkirchen.

All three giants of the discipline were in the lead after first run: Marcel Hirscher in pole position, ahead of Ted Ligety +0.63 and Alexis Pinturault +0.94. Together, these three shared 44 wins out of the 48 last giant slalom World Cup races, which means since February 2012!

With a solid second run, Ted Ligety made his comeback on the World Cup podium, grabbing today’s third place. Since his win in Sölden in 2015, the American had to fight with different back and knee injuries that prevented him to race at his best level. The timing of this podium placement is perfect for Ligety, who can now head to the Olympic Winter Games boosted with confident, as he is also the defending champion on the course in YongPyong.

In the second run, one of the young and wild giant slalom athletes was able to claim a first World Cup podium in career; it's Manuel Feller. The Austrian scored three Top 5 in this discipline this season, and was knocking on the podium’s door with some very fast sections. Today the racer from Fieberbrunn proved that he can bring it down in giant slalom and adds another podium to his silver medal in slalom from the World Championships in St. Moritz 2017.

As constant as always, Marcel Hirscher charged the second run as well and was able to hold on to his lead to finish +1.57 ahead of his contenders. 7 wins out of 8 giant slalom races, 10 wins this season, 55 World Cup wins in career, Marcel Hirscher keeps improving his statistics and is excited to head to the Olympic Winter Games after the City Event of Stockholm next Tuesday evening.

With nearly two years off due to injury, Ligety has struggled to put two clean runs together this season in his return to the FIS World Cup circuit. But after a solid training block with teammates Lindsey Vonn (Vail, Colo.) and Andrew Weibrecht (Lake Placid, N.Y.) in Italy prior to Garmisch, Ligety was ready for action and crushed two strong runs in front of the cheering German fans. He finished third behind Austrian teammates Marcel Hirscher and Manuel Feller.

“It’s been really nice to finally be back on the podium,” said Ligety, whose last podium was at Beaver Creek in 2015. “It’s been a tough battle the last couple of years here with injuries and it’s nice to feel like I’m starting to ski better.”

Ligety has had success in Garmisch in the past—this was his third World Cup podium at the venue and he holds a gold from their 2011 World Championships. But the podium isn’t quite enough for Ligety, who is looking for his third Olympic gold next month. “There’s still some things to do,” Ligety continued. “It’s nice that we have a couple of weeks here before the giant slalom at the Olympics, so we can figure out those next steps. We’re still a little bit off and I have to find that next step and be really fast. I’m not going to sit here and be psyched on this—I’m going to move forward and keep working.”

Behind Ligety, Tim Jitloff (Reno, Nev.) finished 20th and Tommy Ford (Bend, Ore.) was 27th. 

There will be one last stop on the Audi FIS Ski World Cup Tour before the Olympic Winter Games in PyeongChang 2018, the City Event in Stockholm. The best 12 male and female will compete head-to-head for the World Cup win on Tuesday evening. 

The U.S. men will not race in the Stockholm city event on Tuesday, and will instead train for the PyeongChang Olympics in two weeks. Downhill training starts February 8.