U.S. Nationals: Francis wins first career U.S. title

SUGARLOAF, Maine — Sometimes the simplest explanation is the best.
    “Super G’s been super good for me this year,” said Kevin Francis after winning the first U.S. title of his career Sunday at the Nature Valley U.S. Alpine Championships, beating back U.S. Ski Team veterans Bryon Friedman in second and Marco Sullivan in third. The recently crowned 2008 NorAm super G champion, Francis benefited from what he called a “sweet course report” from his coach to edge Friedman by 0.11 seconds.
    “I’ve had that good feeling in super G, which is hard to find. But once you have it you just kind of go with it,” Francis said. “It seems to work, day after day, which is nice.”
    Francis, a five-year veteran of the U.S. team, clocked a time of 1 minute, 19.62 seconds on Sugarloaf’s Narrow Gauge run. Starting fifth and with Friedman in the lead at 1:19.73 after starting No. 2, Francis admitted he got a little lucky with the wind. He timed his start perfectly and managed to avoid any gusts and entered the top flat section of the course with good speed.

SUGARLOAF, Maine — Sometimes the simplest explanation is the best.
    “Super G’s been super good for me this year,” said Kevin Francis after winning the first U.S. title of his career Sunday at the Nature Valley U.S. Alpine Championships, beating back U.S. Ski Team veterans Bryon Friedman in second and Marco Sullivan in third. The recently crowned 2008 NorAm super G champion, Francis benefited from what he called a “sweet course report” from his coach to edge Friedman by 0.11 seconds.
    “I’ve had that good feeling in super G, which is hard to find. But once you have it you just kind of go with it,” Francis said. “It seems to work, day after day, which is nice.”
    Francis, a five-year veteran of the U.S. team, clocked a time of 1 minute, 19.62 seconds on Sugarloaf’s Narrow Gauge run. Starting fifth and with Friedman in the lead at 1:19.73 after starting No. 2, Francis admitted he got a little lucky with the wind. He timed his start perfectly and managed to avoid any gusts and entered the top flat section of the course with good speed. 
    “The fourth gate, you just had to get a little more direction and that took me down that top flat a little quicker so I was able to carry some speed up there,” he said. “Then coming down the pitch I thought I set it up a little too much but I ended up carrying enough speed down onto the flats.
    “Then the flat was just shifting gears, going fast, which is the funnest thing you can do. I had a great time today.”
Francis called Sunday’s victory probably his biggest of the season, and added that he loved racing at nationals even despite the brutal winds that postponed racing three days at these championships.
    “After waiting four days to race, my coach came up to me last night and said, ‘You’re looking kind of sad, what’s going on?’ ” Francis said. “I said, ‘Let me go ski some speed, I’ll have a smile on my face tomorrow.’ ”
    With his NorAm super G title wrapped up, Francis has earned starting slots for World Cup super G’s next season so he hopes Sunday’s title just cements those berths. Friedman, however, was racing with a lot more pressure as he hopes to return full-time to the World Cup after losing three seasons to injury after a 2004 crash shattered his lower right leg.
    Friedman needs to score points at these championships, and although he didn’t pull out the win Sunday, he’s skiing without pain in the leg but entered nationals after a frustrating NorAm season.
    “I’m stoked,” Friedman said of his result. “I’ve been waiting all season to have good conditions, good snow, good start position and a real super G. I’ve been racing the NorAms and it’s just been GS-like super G’s. I’m more of a glider, a downhiller and this is my course.”
    Friedman praised the Narrow Gauge track and said it compares more to a World Cup course than what he’s raced on the NorAm circuit. 
    “This is a little flat, and there are usually more challenging elements to World Cup courses but this is more like it, more like my scene,” he said. “[This result] just came at the right time, I was under a lot of pressure, I’m still under a lot of pressure this week to get results and it went well today.”
    Friedman will look to reach the top of the podium in the downhill race, which will likely be run Monday afternoon after a morning training run. One racer who won’t be competing in the nationals downhill is Sullivan. He’s leaving Sugarloaf on Monday to fly west to Whistler to train on a section of the course that will be used for the 2010 Olympics. Sullivan, who secured the first World Cup downhill win of his career this season at Chamonix, would have worn the bull’s eye in the downhill and he was the low points man in the super G as well.
    “Points wise, I was kind of the guy to beat so I knew all of these guys would be charging and I was givin’ her too but I was just too slow,” he said.

Did not start 1st run :

HARDY Colton (USA)

Did not finish 1st run 
:

JAMPOLSKY Grant (USA)