Wengen: Miller matches Mahre win mark

Dust off that record book. Bode Miller has won the Lauberhorn downhill in no uncertain fashion and caught Phil Mahre's 25 year old U.S. win record with his 27th win.
    Miller scorched the longest downhill on the World Cup circuit overpowering the field. Only Swiss veteran Didier Cuche, in his ninth official World Cup trip down the famed course could come within a full second of Miller's time of 2:30.40. Canadian Manuel Osborne-Paradis was third, one and a third seconds back and downhill standings leader Michael Walchhofer was fourth, giving up the standings lead. 

Dust off that record book. Bode Miller has won the Lauberhorn downhill in no uncertain fashion and caught Phil Mahre's 25 year old U.S. win record with his 27th win.
    Miller scorched the longest downhill on the World Cup circuit overpowering the field. Only Swiss veteran Didier Cuche, in his ninth official World Cup trip down the famed course could come within a full second of Miller's time of 2:30.40. Canadian Manuel Osborne-Paradis was third, one and a third seconds back and downhill standings leader Michael Walchhofer was fourth, giving up the standings lead.
    The win marked the third straight year Americans have claimed Switzerland's premier downhill. Miller also won last season and Daron Rahlves in 2006.
    "It was extremely fun," said Miller. "It didn't feel that good in terms of the quality of the skiing but I was very aggressive. I kept really pushing forward the whole time. There was no braking."
    Miller trailed Osborne-Paradis at the first split and failed to match Cuche's speed under the Water Station tunnel. But the American pulled away on the long gliding sections in the second half of the course. After clearing the jump into the finish he looked at his time and pumped his fist.
    "I take a little bit more of a direct line," he said. "I just cut off a lot of distance, especially when the speeds are a little slower."
    Miller also said finishing third Friday in the super combined, which includes a shortened downhill and one run of slalom, helped him sort out some speed sections. "I learned that there were curves I couldn't ski full speed. I took them a bit slower today and I had a tighter line." He added, "If you ski crappy the wins don't mean that much. Today, I"m very proud of the way I skied. I fought hard."
    Race day was sunny, but snows overnight dumped a meter of snow on the upper reaches of the course and although course workers did a fantastic job of clearing down to the ice underneath, some sections were notably slower.
    "It was amazingly beautiful," said U.S. Head Coach Phil McNichol. "just a killer day. They got way more snow than was forecasted. They cleared it all off and the track was pretty damn good."
    The coach said Miller has just become comfortable at Wengen and skied that way.
    "He tore up the SG turns after the tunnel, really picked up a bunch of heat. The finish turns can be quite daunting and he just nailed them. Wengen has really turned into  venue he's really comfortable with."
    Behind Osborne-Paradis at the first checkpoint, Miller blew past the Canadian in the second section.
    "I screwed up just before the Minsch-Kante," Osborne-Paradis said, "and figured I had nothing to lose, so I just pinned it the rest of the way. In the S, he said, "I caught my (boot) buckle a little bit on the (safety) bag. I wanted to take that line and was wondering if I could get away with it. It was line I hadn't tried all week, but I had screwed up Canadian corner and so and was a little slower…so I thought I'd try it." He said he was surprised when he got to the finish and discovered he was in the lead.
    Five skiers later, Miller changed that. U.S. coach Chris Brigham called Miller's run, "Fantastic skiing. He crushed it."
    Cuche had a pretty good run himself, only to finish second to Miller for the second straight year. Still, he maintained the lead in the downhill and vowed he would continue to seek that title.
    "His (Miller) line was certainly more direct than mine in the middle part, it was worth it for him, but I'm still happy with my performance," Cuche said. "I was surely going for victory today. … (but) I knew about his performance prior to my start so I was aware that I had to raise my level to a maximum."
    Cuche said having the standings lead was nice, but added, "this was only the fifth downhill this season and so many (five) are left. It's for sure nice to be fighting again for the Cup, but more important is to get the red bib after the last race at Bormio."   
    Miller wasn't the entire U.S. story. Marco Sullivan finished seventh and Steven Nyman 11th.
    "Marco had a fantastic run," said McNichol. "He did a great job all the way down. He would have put himself in contention if he'd killed the bottom. He slid out the finish S turn…  You have to put a little slide in there and then stomp on the edge and he never really hooked up that turn, slid the next one and lost three to six tenths in there. But top ten at the Lauberhorn for him is a big race. He's really starting to build some good momentum."
    Miller joins an elite group of skiers to have won the Wengen downhill more than once. Stephan Ebertharter, the man now just ahead of him on the all-time win list won in 2003 and 2003. Kristian Ghedina, Marc Girardelli and Franz Klammer are the only other skiers in the World Cup era to have accomplished the feat. Before that Karl Schranz, Toni Sailer, Othmar Schneider, Karl Molitor, Rudolf Graf, Heinz VonAllmen, Christian Rubi and Fritz Steuri collected multiple wins on the course which has held annual races since 1930. Molitor holds the record with five wins between 1939 and 1945.

-The Associated Press, USSA and Patrick Lang contributed to this story

The SCOOP

By Hank McKee

Men's Downhill, Wengen, Switzerland, Jan. 13, 2008
Skier, skis/boots/bindings
1 Miller, Head/Head/Tyrolia
2 Cuche, Head/Head/Tyrolia
3 Osborne-Paradis, Rossignol/Rossignol/Rossignol
4 Walchhofer, Atomic/Atomic/Atomic
5 Buder, Head/Lange/Tyrolia
6 Jerman, Stoeckli/Lange/Atomic
7 Sullivan, Nordica/Nordica/Marker
8 Sulzenbacher, Fischer/Lange/Fischer
9 Maier, Head/Head/Head
10 Streitberger, Fischer/Fischer/Fischer
 
Men's Downhill, Wengen, Switzerland, Jan. 13, 2008. … It is the 20th of 40 races on the men's 2008 World Cup schedule. … It is the fifth of ten scheduled downhills. … It is the third and final race of the 78th annual Lauberhorn. … It is the 34th World Cup DH at Wengen. … The downhill was postponed one day (flip-flopped with the slalom) due to weather and heavy snows.
    It
is the 27th career World Cup win for Bode Miller. … That matches him with Phil Mahre for the U.S. record and places him in a tie for seventh (among men) all-time. … He is now two wins behind Stephan Eberharter. … It is his sixth career DH win and second of the season having also won at Bormio Dec. 29. … It is his second straight win in DH at Wengen (exactly a year apart), stretching a U.S. win streak to three with Daron Rahlves having won the race Jan. 14, 2006. … It is Miller's fourth podium of the season and second at Wengen having placed third in the combined Jan. 11. … His last six wins have been in either DH or SG dating back to March 16, 2006.
It is the 36th career World Cup podium for Didier Cuche. … His sixth of the season. … And his third this season in downhill. … He takes over the lead of the DH standings by one point over Miller. … It is the second straight season he has finished second to Miller in the Wengen DH. … He is the only skier to finish within a second of Miller.
    It is the third career podium for Manuel Osborne-Paradis, all in DH. … It is his first podium of the season, the others a second at Lake Louise Nov. 25, 2006 and a third at Val d'Isere Jan. 20, 2007. … He has two previous results at Wengen both in the twenties.
    It is the fourth best result of Marco Sullivan's career and his fifth top 10. … His top result, and only podium, was earlier this season when he placed second at Lake Louise Nov. 24. … Steven Nyman matches his seventh best career result and records his second best finish of the season, the only better a second at Beaver Creek Nov. 30. … His 11th place matches his result from Wengen a season ago. … John Kucera matches his fifth best DH result in 19th. … It is his tenth best result – in all disciplines – this season. … It is his third best result, of five in all disciplines, at Wengen. … It is the 21st best career result for Scott Macartney. … His sixth scoring result of the season.  … Erik Guay finished 31st, .12 of a second from scoring.
    Winning margin is .65 of a second. … Top two are within the same second. … Top seven within two seconds. … 19th place is over three seconds out. … Benjamin Raich (did not race) holds the lead of the World Cup overall standings 690-611 over Bode Miller. … Cuche sits third at 605 and Daniel Albrecht (27th in race) is fourth with 566pts. Jean-Baptiste Grange (did not race) is fifth at 456 and Ted Ligety sixth at 440. … Cuche leads the downhill standings by one point over Miller 284-283. … Michael Walchhofer (fourth in race) dips to third with 280pts. … Austria leads the men's Nations Cup 3473-2279 over Switzerland. … Italy is third at 1771 and the U.S. fourth at 1656. … Canada is sixth behind France with 1036pts.