Lenzerheide: Austria dominant in team event

Austria rolled to its third straight nations team event win Friday, while the U.S. team made a late rally to avoid a repeat of its last-place result from the Are World Championships.
     The Austrians led after the morning super G and rode cruise control to the win at World Cup Finals, repeating its win from last season’s Finals and February’s World Championships.
    Italy finished second and France third as late slalom trouble cost Sweden and Canada podiums.
    American Ted Ligety sizzled to win his slalom leg, and Kaylin Richardson was second in her slalom leg as the Americans finished sixth, just a point behind fourth-place finishers Canada and Sweden.
    Seven teams of six skiers were in the event at the World Cup Finals. Two men and two women raced one super G each in the morning, and four raced in the slalom heats later in the day.
LENZERHEIDE, Switzerland — Austria rolled to its third straight nations team event win Friday, while the U.S. team made a late rally to avoid a repeat of its last-place result from the Are World Championships.
    The Austrians led after the morning super G and rode cruise control to the win at World Cup Finals, repeating its win from last season’s Finals and February’s World Championships.
    Italy finished second and France third as late slalom trouble cost Sweden and Canada podiums.
    American Ted Ligety sizzled to win his slalom leg, and Kaylin Richardson was second in her slalom leg as the Americans finished sixth, just a point behind fourth-place finisher Sweden. Canada tied for fourth in points but dropped to fifth after tiebreakers.
    “It was a good run,” Ligety said. “I didn’t feel like I was very good on the top part. That steep part is pretty hectic for sure, and it’s hard to get into a rhythm. I was good on the flats where you could just rip it.
    “How I skied on the top wasn’t really anywhere close to where I needed to be, but once I hit the flats I could start letting it roll.”
    “We still aren’t skiing up to our potential, skiing like we know these athletes can, but this was a big improvement," U.S. Alpine Director Jesse Hunt said. "We got people into the finish and we had some good speed at the end. Ted did an outstanding job in the last run, and Kaylin had a solid run.
    “We were humiliated the last time [in Are] with so many crashes, and I feel much better about the effort and the energy this time. We’re back on our feet and getting people down the hill, and that’s a good step forward,” Hunt said.
    Seven teams of six skiers were in the event at the World Cup Finals. Two men and two women raced one super G each in the morning, and four raced in the slalom heats later in the day.
    The U.S. team needed four big contributions in slalom to have a chance at the podium. Richardson made some mistakes but hung on for second, and Ligety’s win boosted the U.S. fortunes. But Bode Miller struggled his entire run, finishing sixth, and Resi Stiegler was off her game — finishing fifth — on a course that devoured a number of slalom aces.
    “I don’t really know what happened — I haven’t talked to my coaches yet — but I pretty much was the slowest skier, so we’re going to have to work on some things for tomorrow [Saturday’s slalom],” Stiegler said. “But it was pretty soft, so maybe I just skied too round.”
    Richardson said, “I made a mistake before the flats and I just kept trying to go through it. I did not think I was going to get second for my set.
    “It definitely was a little ragged in spots. Honestly you just had to go for it. There’s a fine line between being really fast and also we wanted to finish. We kind of had some trouble at world champs.”
    Stiegler said the run had value as a learning tool for the individual slalom Saturday.
    “Yeah, it definitely helps,” she said. “The [steep top] pitch was not what I expected inspecting. It was totally fine for me after I went down it, but I didn’t know it was that steep. It’s pretty sweet now that I got a run in on it.”
    “It’s actually pretty forgiving,” Richardson said. “It’s not that tough. You’ve just got to stay over your skis to press it down that first pitch. It’s a really fun hill. I think it’s going to be great tomorrow.”
    Michaela Kirchgasser (second), Reinfried Herbst (fifth), Andrea Fischbacher (fifth) and Manfred Pranger (fourth) contributed to Austria in the slalom. Earlier in the day, the Austrians were boosted by Mario Scheiber and Fischbacher, who won their super G heats, with Christoph Gruber adding a second and Kirchgasser a third.
    The Canadians were second early in the day following strong performances from Francois Bourque and Erik Guay, but Emily Brydon and Britt Janyk missed gates and had to hike in the slalom. Host Switzerland had been second but dropped to third after Marc Berthod finished second-slowest in the final heat, then fell to last after Berthod and Aline Bonjour skied out in slalom.
   The U.S. entered its best men, but the country’s top two women were absent. Olympic giant slalom champion Julia Mancuso, who is still trying to catch two Austrians in the chase for the World Cup overall title, skipped the team event to rest for the weekend’s slalom and giant slalom. Lindsey Kildow is out for the season after injuring her knee in slalom training at the World Championships in Are, Sweden, last month.

U.S. struggles in super G
    After the four super G legs in the morning, the U.S. team sat sixth out of seven teams. Austria finished the super G heats with seven points. Canada had 11 and Switzerland 14. Italy was fourth with 15, followed by France with 19.
    Stiegler was solid enough in her super G run to place the U.S. team fifth after the opening leg. The men’s leg followed, but Miller skied wide and lost precious time midway down the course, finishing last among the seven men in his leg.
    “Bode was a little low coming off the turns in the pitch and made a mistake,” U.S. head men’s speed coach Chris Brigham said. “Our plan was to run it with a little more space. With the girls [running first], we hadn’t seen any guys except for [Patrik] Jaerbyn, who came down ahead of him, and he blew it too, so that was tough.”
    Stacey Cook could manage just the sixth-fastest super G run in the next leg, but Steven Nyman’s solid super G run (third-fastest out of seven) allowed the U.S. team to move up one notch.
    “Bode’s [course] report really helped," Nyman said. "Where he went out we had thought we could belly the delay but it was too rough and you needed a really quick tempo to get over in time."
    “Steven skied quite well. He’s tired, it’s the end of the season, but he still had a good time out there,” Brigham said.

Nyman targets Alaska
    Nyman’s World Cup season is done. He’ll set his sights on medals at the U.S. national championships in Alyeska later this month.

    “Steven’s going home for a well-deserved break. Second year full-time on the World Cup, he’s a little banged up right now and needs some time off,” Brigham said.
    Nyman finished the season ranked 10th in downhill, 25th in super G and 24th overall (with two tech races remaining).
    “For the second half of his season, he skied very well, but it was also at places where he’d only been once or hadn’t been to yet,” Brigham said. “The kid has so much speed and he put himself in situations where his speed was faster than his ability was for that particular situation. Results aside, he skied very well in the second half of the season. Sometimes results come, sometimes they don’t.
    “I would say that’s the general story for a lot of the other guys on the speed team. Through the end of the year we had some really good skiing, just not putting it down and getting the results that people are expecting. We’re still very happy with how everything went.”
    Brigham was relieved that Miller secured the coveted super G crystal globe on Thursday.
    “Bode’s given [titles] to us before. I was a nervous wreck all morning,” the coach said. “I knew he just had to be 10th or 11th or better, but we saw the course set in the morning and it was super tight, skied more like a giant slalom, more suited to the GS skiers, which was up his alley, but you never know what’s going to happen with ‘the Bode show.’ ”

— Gary Black Jr. contributed to this report

Lenzerheide World Cup team event results
Final results after the slalom leg
1. Austria, 23 points.
2. Italy, 29.
3. France, 31.
4. Sweden, 34.
5. Canada, 34.
6. United States, 35.
7. Switzerland, 38.

Slalom
Heat 1
1. Therese Borsson, Sweden, 50.59.
2. Michaela Kirchgasser, Austria, 51.96.
3. Sandra Gini, Switzerland, 52.10.
4. Florine De Leymarie, France, 52.48.
5. Resi Stiegler, United States, 52.58.
6. Emily Brydon, Canada, 1:05.81, did not qualify, 7 points.
7. Daniela Merighetti, Italy, 1:06.72, DNQ, 7 points.

Heat 2
1. Jens Byggmark, Sweden, 48.12.
2. Julien Lizeroux, France, 48.55.
3. Cristian Deville, Italy, 48.66.
4. Michael Janyk, Canada, 48.69.
5. Reinfried Herbst, Austria, 48.75.
6. Bode Miller, United States, 48.79.
7. Silvan Zurbriggen, Switzerland, 49.17.

Heat 3
1. Chiara Costazza, Italy, 51.72.
2. Kaylin Richardson, United States, 53.54.
3. Anna Ottosson, Sweden, 53.80.
4. Marie Marchand-Arvier, France, 54.48.
5. Andrea Fischbacher, Austria, 55.25.
6. Britt Janyk, Canada, 1:21.92, DNQ, 7 points.
7. Aline Bonjour, Switzerland, did not finish, 7 points.

Heat 4
1. Ted Ligety, United States, 48.87.
2. Jean-Baptiste Grange, France, 49.06.
3. Manuel Moelgg, Italy, 49.17.
4. Manfred Pranger, Austria, 49.19.
5. Thomas Grandi, Canada, 49.93.
7. Marc Berthod, Switzerland, DNF, 7 points.
7. Markus Larsson, Sweden, DNF, 7 points.

Results from the morning super G leg
1. Austria, 7 points.
2. Canada, 11.
3. Switzerland, 14.
4. Italy, 15.
5. France, 19.
6. United States, 21.
7. Sweden, 22.

Super G
Heat 1
1. Andrea Fischbacher, Austria, 49.43.
2. Daniela Merighetti, Italy, 50.04.
3. Emily Brydon, Canada, 50.15.
(tie) Fraenzi Aufdenblatten, Switzerland, 50.15.
5. Resi Stiegler, United States, 50.62.
6. Ingrid Jacquemod, France, 50.69.
Did Not Start (7 points): Sweden.

Heat 2
1. Francois Bourque, Canada, 47.37.
2. Christoph Gruber, Austria, 48.01.
3. Silvan Zurbriggen, Switzerland, 48.02.
4. Peter Fill, Italy, 48.49.
5. Julien Lizeroux, France, 48.96.
6. Patrik Jaerbyn, Sweden, 49.88.
7. Bode Miller, United States, 51.45.

Heat 3
1. Marie Marchand-Arvier, France, 50.04.
2. Nadia Styger, Switzerland, 50.37.
3. Michaela Kirchgasser, Austria, 50.77.
4. Britt Janyk, Canada, 51.08.
(tie) Anna Ottosson, Sweden, 51.08.
6. Stacey Cook, United States, 51.20.
Did Not Start (7 points): Italy.

Heat 4
1. Mario Scheiber, Austria, 47.30.
2. Massimiliano Blardone, Italy, 47.85.
3. Steven Nyman, United States, 48.09.
(tie) Erik Guay, Canada, 48.09.
5. Niklas Rainer, Sweden, 48.11.
6. Marc Berthod, Switzerland, 48.82.
7. Yannick Bertrand, France, 49.05.