Are: Mancuso adds silver to medal collection

ARE, Sweden — Julia Mancuso added the final color to her precious medal collection Friday with a silver in the super combined.
    The 22-year-old now has five medals in either World Championship or Olympic competition, further cementing Mancuso’s place as one of the best big-event ski racers in the history of American racing.
ARE, Sweden — Julia Mancuso added the final color to her precious medal collection Friday with a silver in the super combined.
    The 22-year-old now has five medals in either World Championship or Olympic competition, further cementing Mancuso’s place as one of the best big-event ski racers in the history of American racing. She also became the first U.S. racer to medal in a major championship in three straight years (two bronze medals at the Bormio worlds in 2005, Olympic gold in GS in ’06). She’s a cool customer in big races, and Mancuso said a relaxed attitude in Are may have helped spark her run to silver on Friday.
    “I sort of took on a different attitude. I was very relaxed and enjoying my time in Sweden,” said Mancuso, referring to the three days of weather delays to start these World Championships that may have stressed out other racers here.
    “Even today I got up and didn’t feel very nervous. I’m just enjoying my time in Sweden, not putting too much pressure on the races and taking what I get.”
    Mancuso’s a California girl and spends portions of her summers in Hawaii, but she’s adapted well to the brutal cold here in Are. The temperature on Friday morning was the lowest it has been since the event began, about minus-16 Fahrenheit, and the mercury didn’t rise much throughout the day.  
    Mancuso said the cold stiffened her slalom boots to the point that she couldn’t race in them. She had to switch to her GS boots for the super combined slalom run.
    “I couldn’t flex them, I couldn’t even get them off they were so stiff,” she said. “I took two runs on the warm-up course and it was the worst warm-up I ever had. I knew I had to do something different.”
    Mancuso conferred with U.S. tech coach Chris Knight and they made the decision to switch to the GS boots. Regardless of the boot choice, Mancuso said she knew making time up on eventual gold medalist Anja Paerson would be difficult with the Swede having nearly a full second lead after the downhill portion.  
    “I knew leaving the gate that I had to fight all the way to the finish, and to me that’s what the combined is — just fighting, all day,” Mancuso said. “The downhill I thought I did a pretty good job. I was pretty far behind Anja and I knew it would be tough to get the gold from that. Going into the slalom there were so many slalom skiers that were close and I hadn’t trained too much slalom. I just charged.”
    Mancuso is charging into the record book of U.S. ski racing. She’ll race the downhill on Sunday, the giant slalom next Tuesday and the nations team event on Sunday, Feb. 18. Up first, though, is a day off on Saturday and a chance to sleep in.