|
www.skiworldcup.org/Sestriere (ITA) 11.03.2004
|
|
Women's Super G - Race report
|
| Report I Race results I SWC SG I Overall |
Styger
surprises with Super-G victory, Goetchl
wraps up another world cup title.
Sestrieres, March 10, 2004. Nadia Styger
of Switzerland won the first race of
her career as she upset the favorites
to take the World Cup finals Super-G
race. Styger's time of 1:25.53 was .32
seconds faster than young phoneme Maria
Riesch of Germany. Veteran Austrian
star Michaela Dorfmeister was third
with a delay of 36/100.
It’s the first victory of the Swiss
women’s team this winter. In the
downhill, another Swiss, Sylviane Berthod,
was an excellent 2nd, also her best
performance of the season.
Austria’s Renate Goetschl, who
was fighting for the Super-G and the
overall titles, only landed at a far
8th place, a few hundredths of a second
behind a surprising Anja Paerson who
increased her lead in the overall standings.
Yet as France’s Carole Montillet
was a far 16th – and didn’t
score any point – Goetschl captured
her second World Cup title within 24
hours. Dorfmeister took 4th place beating
Germany’s Hilde Gerg by a single
point!
The 25-year-old Styger, who has a history
of injuries, including knee ligament
damage three different seasons had to
fight hard until enjoying such a great
moment. This season, however, she was
in the top ten 11 times, with her previous
best a fourth place in the St. Moritz
downhill.
"I have been fighting very hard
the whole winter for a podium but wasn’t
able to achieve it, I often missed it
by only a few hundredths,” Styger
said.
"It was so frustrating, so that’s
why this result is so wonderful. I dedicate
this victory to our coach, Angelo Maina,
who is leaving the team after the season."
Goetschl won three of the eight Super-Gs,
Lake Louise, Canada, Cortina d'Ampezzo
and Are, Sweden. That was good enough
for 467 points, 65 more than Carole
Montillet of France. She was very pleased
by her second triumph in a row.
"This season was similar for Hermann
(Maier) and myself because we both were
coming back from injuries," Goetschl
said." That’s why winning
this second World Cup title is so sweet."
Renate felt she made it tougher on herself
because she was pretty inconsistent
from race to race. "I won in the
first race at Lake Louise, came second
at Megève (France) then slumped
for the two races before winning again,"
she explained. "Fortunately I was
able to win that third race in Sweden
and that helped me. It’s really
great to win another title today. It
was my priority. I didn’t thought
a moment about the overall title. And
for the moment, I don’t know if
I’ll race the slalom on Saturday!
It’s really hard to beat Anja.”
The Swedish Superstar was more than
delighted by her performance –
the best in her career in Super-G. She
was aiming for a top-15 and didn’t
expect to beat Renate in that event.
“This is really great, I did much
better than I thought today despite
a very controlled run,” she said.
“This morning I was ready to take
a lot of risks but then I got nervous
and I was more cautious. So this result
is excellent, I’m really happy.
My chances are getting very strong and
I hope to wrap the title on Saturday
in the slalom.”
Almost as happy as Anja was her mother
Madeleine, who was quite anxious watching
her daughter coming donw the demanding
slope. “I feel much better now,
this has been really hard for my nerves,”
she said. “Anja is incredible!”
Manuèle Lang
|
|
|
