Bruhin, Grabner take PSL victories on Soelden glacier

Bruhin, Grabner take PSL victories on Soelden glacier{mosimage}Ursula Bruhin of Switzerland got the best of teammate Daniela Meuli in the finals to take the parallel slalom World Cup race at Soelden, Austria, on Sunday. In the men’s race, Siegfried Grabner of Austria got his second straight podium, this time a win, with a finals victory over Italy’s Roland Fischnaller.

Mueli moved up the runner-up spot after finishing third in Saturday’s parallel GS on the Rettenbach Glacier. On the men’s side, Grabner also improved one place in the standings after finishing second to Swiss Urs Eiselin in the PGS.

No American women made it to the final 16. The top finisher was Stacia Hookom, 21st in qualifying. Lisa Kosglow was 30th, Michelle Gorgone 46th and Lynn Ott 52nd in the field of 56 riders.

Chris Klug was the lone American qualifier on the men’s side. He qualilfied 11th and lost in the first round of the finals to Fischnaller, the eventual runner-up. In qualifying, Peter Thorndife was 33rd, Eric Warren 37th, Ryan McDonald 38th and Adam Smith was a DNF. Sixty three riders started for the men.

Grabner took the lead in the World Cup parallel standings, with Jasey Jay Anderson of Canada in second. Klug is the top American in 17th. Austria’s Doris Krings, who won the first two parallel events of the season, including the PGS at Soelden on Saturday, leads the women’s standings, with Meuli in second. Kosglow is 12th for the U.S. team.

Next stop for the FIS Nokia Snowboard World Cup is an indoor parallel slalom event at a ski-dome in Landgraaf, The Netherlands, on October 26.