Cortina downhill training: Merighetti, Maze, Vonn, Mancuso

There must be something about that Dolomite snow. Last year’s Cortina downhill winner Daniela Merighetti clocked the fastest training time on the Olimpia Delle Tofane piste Friday.

After snow forced cancellation of yesterday’s training, the weather was clear and cold temperatures overnight made the track harder.

The Italian recorded the quickest run with a time of 1 minute, 40.03 seconds. Not far behind was World Cup Overall leader Tina Maze, 0.22 seconds off the pace, while current leader in the downhill standings Lindsey Vonn took third, 0.60 seconds back. Julia Mancuso rounded out the top four, 0.88 seconds out, and Stacey Cook just cracked into the top 10.  

“I really like this hill. It’s always a pleasure to come to Cortina, three hours away from my home,” said Merighetti. “The snow was still a bit soft despite the cold temperatures. I had to let the skis go and not to be too aggressive.”

Slovenian Tina Maze proved again she can compete in the speed events. “It felt good to ski on this amazing slope today. I think my chance to win is realistic, if I can ski as strong as I’ve been doing so far this season and with a bit of luck. Lindsey seems to be back in a really good shape and Daniela is always very fast here.”

Vonn, who is racing for just the second weekend since coming back from mid-season hiatus, put a solid run together. She was faster than Maze after the last splits but stood up before the finish, as she often does in training.

After hitting a gate, Austria’s Anna Fenninger was victim of a fall and slid into the nets, luckily without injury. She’s expected to race tomorrow. 

Results
Cortina d Ampezzo (ITA)
Training
Ladies’ Downhill
Jan. 18, 2013