Beaver Creek: Nyman, Beckmann emerge with solid results from downhill

Beaver Creek: Nyman, Beckmann emerge with solid results from downhill{mosimage}Daron Rahlves and Bode Miller weren’t the only American downhillers happy to be racing in front of the home crowd Friday on the legendary Birds of Prey Course at Beaver Creek, Colorado.

Including the dynamic duo of Rahlves and Miller, the home team put eight racers in the field. Of the Americans who didn’t celebrate on the podium, Steve Nyman had the best race, finishing in the points at 23rd in 1 minute, 15.28 seconds.

Chris Beckmann, recently named the fourth-best American male junior racer by Ski Racing magazine, was next best, finishing 41st in 1:15.99 in only his second World Cup race. He edged teammate Kevin Francis ,whose 1:16.14 earned him 42nd place. Justin Johnson came in 45th with a time of 1:16.36.

‘My run felt pretty good’ Beckmann said. ‘It was a little rattley, a little rough, but I just kept attacking and I’m happy with it. Number two is out of the way.’

Beckmann now heads back to Canada and Lake Louise – site of his first World Cup race – for a NorAm. The experience of the past two weekends of Word Cup races should help him make this season a turning point, he said.

‘Basically just experiencing these World Cups just gets me fired up and gets the season rolling’ Beckmann said. ‘Now I’m back to Lake Louise for the NorAms there. I was just there for my first [World Cup], so I’m ready for that hill.’

Marco Sullivan and Scot Macartney skied off course and did not finish. Macartney took a particularly scary spill when one of his skies popped off while he was flying down the course, causing him to hit a panel with his forearm.

A clearly frustrated Macartney said he didn’t know why he lost his ski.

‘I don’t know – how many expletives do you want to have to remove from this. I don’t know. I just lost a ski in some bumps, which is something that happens every once in a while, but it seems to happen to me quite a bit’ he said. ‘It’s unbelievably frustrating to go out not because of something you did, but because of something that’s out of your control.’