Ledecka WIns Crans DH, Kristoffersen Tops Garmisch SL

Czech Republic’s Ester Ledecka found her way back to the top of the podium, with Norway’s Ragnhild Mowinckel in second place, and Austria’s Cornelia Huetter continuing her string of strong results in third to round out the podium.

Crans Montana offered up a perfect day for the racers to return to World Cup action with blue skies and crisp temperatures creating ideal course conditions. But the fatigue factor from the return trip home from Beijing may have played a role for many of the favorites, as nearly every medalist from the Olympics was well out of podium range today. Nevertheless, opened up the opportunity for new faces to shine in the downhill as it was the first women’s downhill that didn’t feature a Swiss or Italian winner in the last 15 World Cup outings.

Czech star Ledecká returned from Beijing with a gold in snowboard parallel giant slalom after she defended her title, while she finished just outside the medals on two skis with fourth in Alpine Combined and fifth in Super-G where she was also defending after gold in 2018.

Before she came into the downhill race in Switzerland, the 26-year-old had picked up one Lake Louise downhill win in 2019, one Val-d'Isère Super-G win in 2020 and four other World Cup podiums.

After one of the pre-race favourites Lara Gut-Behrami of Switzerland failed to finish first out of the gate, it was left to Norwegian Ragnhild Mowinckel to post the time to beat fourth down the mountain.

With Olympic champion Corinne Suter and Italian star Sofia Goggia finishing over a second behind, Ledecká seized her opportunity to shine with a lightning run of 1:30.17.

Austrian Cornelia Huetter produced a classy run 19th out the gate to finish 0.42s behind Ledecká, however it was not enough to deny Ledecká her second World Cup downhill win with Mowinckel second.

Ledecká revealed: "I had a bit of health troubles last week, so it was difficult to get back to full strength. Those two trainings were very difficult for me. Those were the worse trainings of my career. But today I felt much better. The body was ready."

The women repeat the downhill on Sunday with Ledecká up to seventh in the title standings behind Goggia, who is now 65 points ahead of Suter with two races remaining.

Italy’s Sofia Goggia, who had an impressive comeback at the Olympics from an injury sustained in Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy to grab silver in the downhill at the Olympics, struggled to approach the race in her normal hard-charging manner. She ended up 12th on the day but remains the leader in the downhill standings with 422 points to Switzerland’s Corrine Suter with 357 points.

Two-time Olympic champion and six-time world champion Mikaela Shiffrin, who opted to sit the Crans-Montana downhills out in order to rest, recharge, and prepare for the upcoming World Cups, retained her overall lead by a mere 15 points (1026 points) over rival Petra Vlhova (1011) from Slovakia. Vlhova decided to leave the Olympics following the slalom to get some training in, entering the Crans-Montana speed races in hopes of skiing fast for valuable points but ended up taking home just two points in Saturday’s downhill, finishing 29th

Over in Germany, Norwegian Kristoffersen was looking to impress after he just missed out on a medal in the Beijing men's slalom following his fourth place while he ended eighth in the giant slalom.

Switzerland's Tanguy Nef eked out a 0.07s first-run gap over Kristoffersen and 0.08s over Meillard with defending FIS World Cup overall champion Alexis Pinturault eighth, Olympic slalom champion Clément Noël 12th and Italian Alex Vinatzer 23rd.

Vinatzer produced an excellent second run to move up into an eventual seventh place as Pinturault slipped down the order and Frenchman Noël skied out as he looked to close the gap to the leaders.

Swiss star Meillard jumped ahead of Austrian Manuel Feller with two left, only for Kristoffersen to edge him out by 0.14s as Nef could not finish to hand the Norwegian his 25th World Cup career win.

The result leaves Kristoffersen, 27, one point behind compatriot Lucas Braathen in the 2021/2022 slalom title standings with Meillard a further nine points back ahead of Sunday's slalom repeat.