World Cup Rewind: 'Sully' kills 'em with his gliding

The final weekend of January was one the U.S. men may choose to highlight and one the women will just as soon forget.
    The best the U.S. team’s publicity department could say after the races at Ofterschwang, Germany, the site of the women’s races, was a sixth-place finish. Chamonix, where the men saw action, resulted in “AK” pins, trophies and the men’s first double-win weekend of the season.
    Marco Sullivan ramped up his status by gaining his first World Cup win at Chamonix in one of the oldest alpine race series, the Arlberg-Kandahar. He becomes the 431st skier to win a World Cup race over the past 40 years and the 36th American.
    It was a course Sullivan had determined in the preseason he would have a shot at winning. “I knew I could kill ’em with my gliding if I could carry my speed off the top,” he said. So he focused on the technical turns high on the course, hit them better on race day than he had in training and then fought to maintain a tuck wherever he could hold it the rest of the way down the long, long Verte track. “I knew this was my kind of course and I knew I had a good run.” He would say. “I knew if I got through there [the top] I could smoke it the rest of the way.”
THE FINAL WEEKEND of January was one the U.S. men may choose to highlight and one the women will just as soon forget.
    The best the U.S. team’s publicity department could say after the races at Ofterschwang, Germany, the site of the women’s races, was a sixth-place finish. Chamonix, where the men saw action, resulted in “AK” pins, trophies and the men’s first double-win weekend of the season.
    Marco Sullivan ramped up his status by gaining his first World Cup win at Chamonix in one of the oldest alpine race series, the Arlberg-Kandahar. He becomes the 431st skier to win a World Cup race over the past 40 years and the 36th American.
    It was a course Sullivan had determined in the preseason he would have a shot at winning. “I knew I could kill ’em with my gliding if I could carry my speed off the top,” he said. So he focused on the technical turns high on the course, hit them better on race day than he had in training and then fought to maintain a tuck wherever he could hold it the rest of the way down the long, long Verte track. “I knew this was my kind of course and I knew I had a good run.” He would say. “I knew if I got through there [the top] I could smoke it the rest of the way.”
    Using all the inspiration he could find, Sullivan said he was skiing for his fallen comrades — Steven Nyman and Scott Macartney, both out to injury — and had drawn his sister’s lucky number for a start position. But it was his skiing that made the difference and U.S. coaches were not surprised at all.
    “This course is right up Marco’s alley,” said speed coach Chris Brigham. “He’s become a much better turner.” When the day dawned bright and sunny with a hard, fast and smooth track, Brigham said he asked at breakfast, ‘Do you suppose they know Marco’s coming today?”
    Sullivan got the win ahead of downhill standings leader Didier Cuche, who said the course was not suited to his technical strengths. Slovenian Andrej Jerman was third for the first Slovene podium of the season.
    Bode Miller had crashed hard in training and even considered shutting it down and not attempting the race. He finished in seventh, using the run as a fast training run for the downhill leg of the combined the next day. TJ Lanning got his fourth career scoring result in 23rd.
    When Miller applied what he had learned in the downhill the next day he put up an enormous lead over the slalom skiers and held on for his second straight combined win. He skied smart, limited his risk in the slalom and limped away with his 29th win, an open padlock on the combined title and the lead in the overall standings.
    “I was not feeling the best today, my body was pretty beaten up," Miller said. “This downhill is really difficult for me to make up speed since there are no real difficult parts in the course. I have been pretty unlucky here [so] it’s nice to win that competition today.”
    The only real challenger was Ivica Kostelic, the only skier within a half second of Miller. Slalom skiers made impressive moves up the finish order, particularly the Frenchmen Julien Lizeroux and Jean-Baptiste Grange but they could come no closer than fourth and fifth at 1.72 and 1.81 seconds out. Rainer Schoenfelder was the bright light for Austria with the only podium placing of the men’s weekend with third in the combined, and he also contributed a surprising fourth in downhill, his only career downhill placing.

Ofterschwang: Karbon cruising toward GS title; Schild back in SL hunt
There was no true U.S. story at Ofterschwang, but the performance of Lindsey Vonn was encouraging as she produced sixth in the GS.
    “GS was her weakest event,” said coach Chris Knight, “but she’s making steady progress. She stands in a better position on her skis and gets more power out of her [stance] now.”
    That she hung in at all was worthy of some kudos. The win went to Denise Karbon. That’s not a surprise as the Italian has won five of the six held. But Karbon was ninth after the first run, a shade over a second off the pace of run winner Nicole Hosp. No matter. That’s when you use that extra gear. Karbon overpowered the field in the second run for the win. She will have to wait until March for the trophy, but she only needs to finish 13th or better in either of the two remaining GS’s for her crown.
    Hosp held on for second place to lead a trio of Austrians. Elisabeth Goergl got third and Kathrin Zettel fourth. Vonn had one of the faster second runs to get sixth and Julia Mancuso was 11th.
    In the slalom, coach Chris Knight said, “Snow snakes got ’em, just reached up and pulled ’em down.”
    Vonn and Mancuso both exited the first course of the slalom in consecutive runs, going out near the same spot.
    Marlies Schild, the defending World Cup slalom champion, got the win, riding a large first-run margin home for her fourth victory of the season. A runaway slalom champ last season, Schild had uncharacteristic mistakes early this season, failing to finish two December slaloms. Now she has closed the gap on slalom leader Hosp to five points, indicating the fight for that title will once again come down to the two Austrians.
    On the day it was Swede Therese Borssen who came closest to Schild and Hosp had to settle for third. Veronika Zuzulova was fourth and Tanja Poutiainen fifth, the entire group finishing in the precise order they started the race.
    Although the men soared with eagles and the women consorted with snakes on one late January weekend as the World Cup moves into the home stretch, there is little to choose between them. The U.S. women are currently second and fifth in the overall standings, first and sixth in downhill, fourth in GS, and third in SG. The men are first and sixth overall, second and fourth in downhill, eighth in slalom, fourth in GS and 1
0th in super G. Bode Miller has a better than even chance to take the combined title this coming weekend and the women sit one and three with two events remaining.
    With five women’s downhills remaining on the schedule versus no more than three in any other discipline, the schedule favors downhill standings leader Vonn. The men have one more slalom remaining than in the other disciplines.