World Cup Rewind: Unseen Levi race big for U.S.

Levi live was not to be found. Not on this side of the pond anyway.

There was nowhere in the U.S. to watch the Levi, Finland slalom races live. You could see it at www.universalsports.com a few hours later, and that's great. But a real time peek was not to be had and that was too bad. It was a pretty good weekend for American ski racers, and a pretty good weekend for World Cup skiing in general.

Lindsey Vonn recorded the second earliest win in U.S. history, and the earliest win ever for a U.S. woman, when she rekindled the slalom prowess of her youth for her first Cup slalom win Nov. 15. That busted Julie Parisien's mark of Nov. 29 (Park City slalom 1992) and the world's perception that Vonn is primarily a downhiller.

Bode Miller – the only U.S. skier with an earlier win, having won at Soelden in October of 2003 – was second to Jean-Baptiste Grange in the men's race Nov. 16. It was his best slalom result in four years and will dispel a few myths as well. He looked solid and controlled. That's a big statement about a guy renown for skiing so fast he blows out of courses.

Levi live was not to be found. Not on this side of the pond anyway.

There was nowhere in the U.S. to watch the Levi, Finland slalom races live. You could see it at www.universalsports.com a few hours later, and that's great. But a real time peek was not to be had and that was too bad. It was a pretty good weekend for American ski racers, and a pretty good weekend for World Cup skiing in general.

Lindsey Vonn recorded the second earliest win in U.S. history, and the earliest win ever for a U.S. woman, when she rekindled the slalom prowess of her youth for her first Cup slalom win Nov. 15. That busted Julie Parisien's mark of Nov. 29 (Park City slalom 1992) and the world's perception that Vonn is primarily a downhiller.

Bode Miller – the only U.S. skier with an earlier win, having won at Soelden in October of 2003 – was second to Jean-Baptiste Grange in the men's race Nov. 16. It was his best slalom result in four years and will dispel a few myths as well. He looked solid and controlled. That's a big statement about a guy renown for skiing so fast he blows out of courses.

Both Vonn and Miller made mistakes; ran into problems in sections of the course that sent many fellow competitors to the lists at the bottom of the result sheets. Both overcame their mistakes in the discipline many consider the least forgiving. It was quite a U.S. showing, and one that signals a huge shift.

The U.S. hadn't recorded a slalom win since Sarah Schleper won at Lenzerheide in the 2005 finals in a race that had no effect on the slalom title. Last season the U.S. scored 709 slalom points over the course of the World Cup season. After roughly 10 percent of the 2009 slalom schedule, the Americans have 189 points or more than a quarter of last season's total. Now figure in Schleper, who has returned after a two-year hiatus, and Ted Ligety who has posted six slalom podiums since Schleper's last win. She was outstanding in making the top 30 after such a long time away. He was second after the first run before a nasty mistake. The slalom group, as a whole, is fast.

"That's the main point," said U.S. men's slalom coach Rudi Soulard.

Perhaps that's truer of the men's team than the women's, but it's hard to tell as yet. There were only three women at Levi, Vonn, who won, Schleper who finished 25th after hiking in the second run, and Hailey Duke who was making her fourth World Cup start. Julia Mancuso and Kaylin Richardson will join the fray in the next slalom at Aspen on Thanksgiving weekend.

The guys had Miller in second and Ligety who was definitely fast. Jimmy Cochran also looked great in the first heat.

"Jimmy was really good on the steeps," said coach Soulard,  "and 'Jit' (Tim Jitloff) was on fire in the first run – he had the third fastest top split until he went out – other coaches where saying 'who's this guy?'
"Actually," Soulard added, "a lot of other coaches were telling me how good our guys looked. We'll head back to Colorado now for some training before the giant slalom at Beaver Creek and we'll do some more slalom training to get ready for Val d'Isere."

 

On the international scale there was a lot to see as well.

It is not easy to comprehend just how fast Grange was at Levi. The numbers, a quarter second in the first run and a half a second in the finale, don't make it clear. This was a man driven.

The Frenchman won some of the biggest slalom races last season, at Kitzbuehel and Wengen, but he was not strong down the stretch and handed off the 2008 title. Apparently that didn't sit well.

"I do not come to the artic to stand in order on the podium," he said. "I want to win directly."

He's on a mission.

Mario Matt, third behind Miller, gave the Austrian men its first podium of the season. The importance of that to the Austrian public cannot be overstated.

Swiss Silvan Zurbriggen in fourth was also remarkable. He started 23rd, is coming off a knee injury and reportedly said the finish was "Insanity. I never would have counted on that."

The number of big number bibs was pretty insane too. More than 40percent of the 22 finishers came from outside the first 30 seeded. Two came from the sixties and three from the fifties. Earmark the names Dominik Stehle
(German, 68th to 19th), Jukka Leino (Finnish, 60th to 18th), Filip Trejbal (Czech 53rd to 17th), Patrick Bechter (Austrian 51st to tenth), and Mitja Valencic (Slovene 59th to ninth). Pretty good day for all these guys.

Vonn's showing upset the women's cart, but Maria Pietilae-Holmner in second and Maria Riesch in third really scattered the apples. Pietilae-Holmner had never been on a World Cup podium in any discipline before, and though Riesch did record a slalom podium last season it has never been her primary discipline.

The core of the women's slalom field was between fourth (Nicole Hosp) and tenth (Monika Bergmann) an indicator the wheels may get back on this cart pretty quickly. Hosp had her difficulties during the run so don't write her title hopes off too quickly. Slovak Veronika Zuzulova and Finn Tanja Poutiainen were – and will be – in range and the ageless Anja Paerson showed rekindled slalom fire in getting seventh. Newcomers to the front pages of slalom results included two Swiss. Denise Feierabend (started 43rd finished 13) and Rabea Grand (34th to 11th). They were the first Cup points for Feierabend, and may have earned her a trip to North America. In two seasons Grand had been a placing better than 11th once, in a combined at St Anton last December. She told Swiss papers she had come to realize what she wanted, and what was necessary to get it. Coaches say she has never approached training as professionally as she has this summer.

There was a lot happening at Levi. Even in time delay, it was well worth watching.