Lindsey Vonn shared the podium with Kajsa Lie and Jacqui Wiles. | Image: FIS Alpine
There were some fears for today’s downhill race after training on Friday, January 9, had been canceled as the storm was still moving through the Alps, but, luckily, snowfall eased enough in the eastern Alps for the races at Zauchensee, Austria, to be held. The start, however, had to be moved down to the backup start due to continuing snowfall and poor visibility higher up.
Vonn skied to a dominant victory on the shortened course, a feat the 41-year-old described with, “I knew it was a sprint and I had to give it everything I had, and I did.” After the training run on Thursday, December 8, where Lindsey Vonn had come 50th, you could have been forgiven for thinking that maybe Vonn was going to cruise for the rest of the season now that she has qualified for the Olympics. But no, the legendary skier had clearly just been taking the training run at face value before unleashing her full potential today when it counted.
Joining Vonn on the podium were Norway’s Kajsa Lie in second place and Jacqui Wiles in third place.
Switzerland’s Corinne Suter set the pace at Zauchenee with a 1:07.34. While her teammate Jasmin Flury could not match that pace, France’s Romane Miradoli managed to improve on that time by 0.37 seconds, before Norway’s Kajsa Lie shot into the lead another 0.36 seconds ahead of the French. Austria’s Ariana Rädler in bib 5 could not use the homerace to her advantage, however, the Norwegian’s lead was nevertheless not long in the making, as Vonn skied into the lead with bib 6, another 0.37 faster than Lie. It did, nevertheless, hold up for second place on the day—the first podium of the season for Lie.
But back to the race—with nine skiers of the top 15 still left to go, it seemed a shake-up was still possible, however, deteriorating course conditions made pursuit increasingly difficult, and big names like Italy’s Sofia Goggia and Austria’s Conny Hütter failed to ski into the top 10. Team USA’s Breezy Johnson in bib 13 managed to ski into what was ultimately seventh place
Then came Team USA’s Jacqui Wiles in bib 16, who proved that it was still possible to ski onto the podium, crossing the finish line less than half a second behind her teammate Vonn and 0.11 seconds behind Lie in third place.
Stand-out performances also came from Switzerland’s Janine Schmitt in bib 24, who skied into fifth place and Italy’s Elena Curtoni in bib 27 who skied into 10th.
Team USA’s Allison Mollin in bib 28 finished in 14th place and with Keely Cashman in bib 22 in 18th place, it meant there were five U.S. women in the top 20.
Unfortunately, the race day also saw a dark spot as Austria’s Magdalena Egger, who had shared the downhill podium with Vonn in St. Moritz Switzerland in December, crashed hard and had to be taken away by helicopter.
The races at Zauchensee continue with a Super-G tomorrow, December 11.