Comeback after two years
German downhill skier surprises – and ends up on the podium
12/20/2025 – 12:07 p.mReading time: 2 minutes
For two years, Kira Weidle-Winkelmann often just followed the competition. Now there is a strong comeback.
The German ski racers have achieved the next podium success of this Olympic winter. Kira Weidle-Winkelmann came in second in the descent from Val d’Isère. She even relegated US star Lindsey Vonn to third place – only Cornelia Hütter from Austria was faster than both of them. A week after her famous downhill victory in St. Moritz, the second German starter Emma Aicher clearly missed the podium this time and finished tenth.
The DSV women’s team has now reached the podium five times this season. Weidle-Winkelmann, who opened the race in France with start number one, said on ZDF: “The feeling during the ride wasn’t 100 percent good. There were one or two small mistakes in the middle part.”
It was precisely in this section that Hütter gained her lead of 0.26 seconds at the end. Vonn also made a mistake and was 0.09 seconds slower than Weidle-Winkelmann. The 41-year-old American had stunned the ski world with a victory in St. Moritz and now showed her extra class again.
But Weidle-Winkelmann is also getting into shape with a view to the Olympics in Cortina d’Ampezzo in February. “It’s really been a dry spell the last two years,” she said, recalling the 2023/24 and 2024/25 seasons. During that time she had always missed out on podium places and was sometimes bitterly disappointed, for example at the World Championships last February in Saalbach-Hinterglemm.
“That was really hard,” reported the 29-year-old. “After last season I took myself out and said: I’m fed up, I have to change something completely. I found a different approach for myself, with a little more fun in the whole sport.”
And that is now paying off: The Starnberg native has achieved the best World Cup result of her career in almost four years; in January 2022 in Altenmarkt-Zauchensee she had already come second. Weidle-Winkelmann, the 2021 World Cup runner-up, is still one win short of his career.