The Fast and the Furious: PGS Drift

Two very familiar faces, though not from recent GS races, were left standing in the final heat of parallel giant slalom in Alta Badia, Italy, this evening. Norwegians Kjetil Jansrud and Aksel Lund Svindal had spent the last hour methodically picking off opponent after opponent on the modified Gran Risa slope. When the snow dust finally settled, it was Jansrud who took his first victory of the season, just edging out his compatriot in the simple, cross-the-finish-first and win format.

The first of it’s kind on the World Cup, today’s PGS was full of surprises, with many pre-race favorites making early exits and a dark horse or two providing thrilling action in the new format.

The night began with the opening round of 32 competitors skiing head-to-head in a run, re-run format, giving each racer a chance to ski both the red and blue courses. From the Round of 16 onward to the final, it was a one run knockout with one very clear rule: Win, or go home.

Third-place finisher Andre Myhrer of Sweden took the victory in the small final by a sizable margin over German surprise contender Dominik Schwaiger, whose best World Cup result before the night was 19th in the previous day’s GS. This result marks Myhrer’s first trip to the podium since his runner-up finish in the 2014 Adelboden slalom.

Also of note was the performance of Italy’s Massimiliano Blardone, who was not even expected to make the 32 racer field, though did so in a qualifier, and shocked the home crowd with a sixth-place finish under the lights.

For Jansrud, finally getting the monkey off of his back and taking a win over his teammate is something he hopes to carry into the Christmas break and through the Santa Caterina downhill on Dec. 27.

“I’ve tried to beat him all year. I’ve been close a few times, but never really gotten there, but it’s a little absurd to finally beat him now in a new parallel discipline,” Jansrud said. “It was absurd the two of us coming all the way to the finals, there were some good vibrations in the start knowing that the grand final was with two downhill Norwegians. I’ll take whatever I can get, so, beat him once and hopefully I can keep on doing that.”

Svindal, who has not traditionally had much success in the parallel format, welcomed the fast paced action and was kept on his toes all night by the short breaks between runs.

“It’s not a normal GS, it’s more of a really short, sprint GS, but it was a cool event for team Norway, really cool. Two Downhill guys in the finals, unbelievable. That’s a bonus and I’ll take it for sure,” Svindal explained. “It was a little stressful because I was always the last guy to go, so I really had to hurry to get back up to the top, but I think that’s kind of a part of the event, everything is high pace. Between runs there’s no time to really think. That’s the way it has to be, high tempo all the way.”

Myhrer, on the other hand, has not finished worse than fourth in a parallel event at the World Cup level, and told reporters that he enjoys the format and hopes to see more parallel events on the World Cup in coming seasons.

“It was a lot of fun. I didn’t expect the jumps from the beginning, you flew quite a lot,” Myhrer said.” I think I managed to do it in a good way and try and find some speed out of it. Really happy with this.”

Surprisingly, many of the World Cup’s top GS skiers looked uncharacteristically sluggish on the relatively flat course, perhaps flustered by having a racer next to them or by two sizable mid-course jumps that quite literally threw almost every racer off line at one point in the night.

Marcel Hirscher, Ted Ligety, Felix Neureuther, and Henrik Kristoffersen were all knocked out in the first round. In fact, six of the top-seven finishers were seeded outside of the top-15, perhaps indicating that success in traditional GS is not indicative of success in the parallel format.

The entire event took under 90 minutes to complete, providing intense, spectator-friendly action in a reasonable amount of time compared to a traditional day-long ski race.

“It seemed like the crowd had a really good time watching here and I hope it was good on television,” added Svindal. “If that’s the case, it’s a cool, cool race and you can always debate if it should be part of World Cup points or not, but it was a cool race and it’s worth doing again.”

For those curious as to how the FIS was able to make a fair race in a one run knockout format, Men’s World Cup Chief Race Director Markus Waldner provided details before the event.

“We measured everything with laser, especially the course setting and the basic course preparation,” Waldner explained. “The slope has been prepared with a GPS-equipped snowcat, so that the snow and the shape of the terrain become very similar, and even equal. The course setting is also done by GPS and we manage to get really close. The difference between both courses is less than 1–2 centimeters.”

The next parallel event on the schedule is a city event in slalom for both the men and women in Stockholm, Sweden, scheduled for Feb. 23.

The men’s tour heads to Madonna di Campiglio, Italy, for the final race before the Christmas break, a night slalom scheduled to begin tomorrow at 5:45pm CET.

View more photos from this race here.

Fans can stay current on the World Cup circuit by downloading the new U.S. Ski Team iOS app powered by Ski Racing here.

The Scoop
By Hank McKee

1. Jansrud, Head/Head/Head
2. Svindal, Head/Head/Head
3. Myhrer, Head/Head/Head
4. Schwaiger, Head/Head/Head
5. Pinturault, Head/Head/Head
6. Blardone, Elan/Nordica
7. Caviezel, Head/Head/Head
8. Faivre, Head/Head/Head
9. Jitloff, Stockli/Lange
10. Muffat Jeandet, Salomon/Salomon/Salomon

• Men’s World Cup parallel giant slalom, Alta Badia, Italy, Dec. 21, 2015.
• It is the 12^th of 45 races on the men’s World Cup schedule. … The fifth of 11 scheduled GSs. … Billed as the first World Cup parallel GS, it is the 33^rd World Cup race hosted by Alta Badia. … Though not parallel events, Marcel Hirscher has won the last three and four of the last five GSs at the site.
• It is the 11^th career World Cup win for Kjetil Jansrud. … It is his first win of the season and fourth podium.
• It is the sixth World Cup podium of the season for Aksel Lund Svindal. … His first that is not a win. … It is his best GS result since 2011.
• It is the 19^th career World Cup podium for Andre Myhrer. … His third in a parallel event.
• It is the ninth career top-10 World Cup finish for Tim Jitloff … his second of the season. … Of the four World Cup parallel events Ted Ligety has participated in, this is the first one in which he didn’t finish ninth.
• Aksel Lund Svindal regains the lead of the World Cup overall standings 600-543 over Marcel Hirscher (28^th in race). … Jansrud is third at 407pts. … Ligety (24^th in race) is seventh overall with 248pts and Travis Ganong (did not race) is 10th with 204pts.
• Hirscher leads the GS standings 363-252 over Victor Muffat-Jeandet (10^th in race). … Felix Neureuther (19^th in race) is third with 209pts. … Ted Ligety is sixth with 157pts.
• Austria leads the men’s Nations Cup 1777-1549 over Norway. … France in third with 1315pts. The U.S. is fifth at 966pts and Canada eighth with 231pts.

Official Results