By ERIC WILLEMSEN, Related Press
SÖLDEN, Austria (AP) — Olympic big slalom champion Marco Odermatt dominated the primary run of the season-opening males’s World Cup race Sunday.
The Swiss skier had a near-flawless run on the steep glacier within the Austrian Alps to construct a lead of greater than four-tenths of a second over second-place Lucas Braathen of Norway.
Odermatt received the race final yr for the primary of his 5 GS victories on the street to his first total title.
Norway’s Braathen, who triumphed within the conventional season opener in 2020, had .41 seconds to make up within the second run. The remainder of the sphere, led by Zan Kranjec of Slovenia, was at the least .69 behind Odermatt.
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“Solely half of the job is finished,” Odermatt mentioned. “I hope the second run goes simply as nicely. I used to be far more relaxed coming right here than in earlier seasons.”
Henrik Kristoffersen was the one racer aside from Odermatt to win a World Cup big slalom final season, however the Norwegian had a pricey mistake coming onto the flats and completed .95 off the lead.
In a outstanding transfer, Kristoffersen switched his ski tools within the offseason, leaving his long-term provider Rossignol to affix the brand new Van Deer-Pink Bull model based by his former rival Marcel Hirscher, the file eight-time total champion who retired three years in the past.
River Radamus was the main contender for the U.S. ski workforce. A yr after getting a career-best sixth at this race, Radamus posted the eleventh time within the opening run, trailing Odermatt by 1.37.
The race came about in sunny circumstances underneath blue skies, a day after the ladies’s race was canceled because of rain and moist snow.
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