At the Super-G in Beaver Creek the knot broke for Marco Odermatt. He is stalking the leaders in the overall World Cup. A young Austrian is also celebrating.
The dominator of the previous season was irritated. The Swiss Marco Odermatt had the podium in the first downhill run of the season in Beaver Creek, but just didn’t manage to win. He had to admit defeat to his teammate Justin Murisier on Friday. And that doesn’t happen very often in the Alpine Ski World Cup.
On Saturday (December 7th, 2024), the 27-year-old turned the tables in the Rocky Mountains in the USA. Odermatt won the first Super-G of the winter – in an impressive manner ahead of the Frenchman Cyprien Sarrazin (0.18 seconds back) and the Austrian Lukas Feurstein (+0.47), who reached the World Cup podium for the first time. Odermatt, who started with number 15, only made minor mistakes. And in the World Cup you usually can’t go without mistakes, so he gave the rest little chance and achieved his first win of the season.
Norwegian Sejersted on the move quickly – but out
The riders in front of him initially had quite a bit of trouble with the Super-G. Of the first ten athletes, only four reached the finish, and the Norwegian Adrian Smiseth Sejersted was particularly annoyed. Up until then he had been traveling extremely fast – but in the end he was also over the limit, which in his case wasn’t the first time.
Unlike the descent on the demanding “Birds of Prey“On Friday, however, this time the elimination was almost exclusively due to goal errors – and fewer falls: Canadian James Crawford fell, but quickly got back up. The Swiss Arnaud Boisset, who fell badly on Friday, also gave the all-clear; he suffered a concussion and abrasions.
Sarrazin sets up, but Odermatt counters powerfully
The first gala ride was achieved on Saturday by Cyprien Sarrazin, the two-time Kitzbühel downhill winner from the previous season. He started on the slopes in twelfth place and set by far the fastest time.
But then Odermatt came. And he pushed the limit and didn’t let the smaller mistakes and the mini-delay in the last split time (0.08 seconds) stop him. Because he drove the straight battle line on the finish slope, he was simply 0.18 seconds ahead of Sarrazin at the finish. When the Frenchman received him there and high-fived him, he must have suspected that that would be enough for the podium.
Odermatt stalks the overall World Cup leaders
Only Lukas Feurstein later came close to the two of them. The 23-year-old made it to his first World Cup podium with a courageous performance and thus redeemed his ski nation. Finally, the first podium place for the Austrian alpine skiing men this winter has been achieved. Behind Feurstein, two young talents, Giovanni Franzoni (Italy, 23 years old) and Fredrik Möller (Norway, 24), also placed fourth – at the same time.
For Odermatt, the overall World Cup winner for the past three years, the victory also means that he now has 180 points in the overall World Cup and is closing in on the leaders Clément Noel and Henrik Kristoffersen (200 points each). He could already take the lead in the upcoming giant slalom on Sunday evening (live from 6 p.m. in the Sportschau stream). Of course, he now leads the Super-G classification, which he won in the last two years.
Simon Jocher loses his stick early – Baumann is in the points
However, the spectators had to wait longer for the German drivers. Simon Jocher was the first to take to the slopes in the Rocky Mountains with start number 30. However, he had his problems with the “Birds of Prey“, lost his stick at the second goal and was eliminated after the first intermediate time after a goal error.
Romed Baumann, however, managed a very respectable run a little later. The 38-year-old crossed the finish line 1.36 seconds behind and finished in the points in 21st place for the first time this winter. However, Luis Vogt in 34th and Jacob Schramm in 38th failed to collect points.