ASPEN, Colorado — Saturday’s giant slalom course elicited plenty of opinions from U.S. racers, particularly the first-run set that featured a number of tight turns that either slowed them down or knocked them out completely.
ASPEN, Colorado — Saturday’s giant slalom course elicited plenty of opinions from U.S. racers, particularly the first-run set that featured a number of tight turns that either slowed them down or knocked them out completely.
    Count speed demon Stacey Cook among those who felt the first run had too many tight turns — way too many in fact.
    “For a downhill skier like me, I personally feel it’s ridiculously turny,” said Cook, who started No. 30 but failed to hold her position and qualify for a second run. “Men’s slaloms have turns that big. The turns are really tight. I haven’t trained that much of that style of GS.
    “I think [that type of set is] barely legal, it’s right on the minimum. It’s not my style. I know that I’m skiing good GS right now and I’ll keep my head up for the next race.”
    Cook said she began her run skiing aggressively but quickly realized that letting her skis run wasn’t an option. Offering no excuses for not making the cut, Cook said she should have skied better
    “I like GS’s where I can get more speed going like the downhilll because that’s what I do. I knew what I had to do [Saturday],” she said. “I kept my focus for the first part of the course, but it’s tough to keep that going when it’s not what you’re used to.”
    Cook’s teammate Caitlin Ciccone made her World Cup debut Saturday and failed to qualify for the second run. She said that the back-and-forth nature of the course was exhausting but manageable. Ciccone just didn’t manage her run well enough.
    “That was nice to get a run down the hill, but my lungs are still burning. I swear I worked out all summer,” Ciccone said in the finish area.
    “The course was great, I just definitely overskied it. It was turny but you could still take risks. Anyway, I didn’t.”
    Ciccone said she failed to make any major mistakes in her run and “that’s not good when that happens.”
     “I just didn’t attack enough, kind of take that extra risk,” she continued. “It was my first World Cup. It was a little nerve-racking, I guess. But once I went I was fine. I just don’t think I attacked enough.”
    American Libby Ludlow, who’s looking to make a dent in the GS rankings this season after a career year in super G in 2005-06, instead began that drive with a DNF Saturday, compliments of a giant pink cast on her right thumb. The cast got caught up on a gate, and the impact dislodged her pole. By the time Ludlow recovered, she had missed the next gate.
    “It happened really fast, and it was a bummer. I was really mad,” Ludlow said. “I wasn’t feeling [my thumb] until the gate jammed it.”
    Ludlow said the injured thumb really affected her training two days ago but she felt good about her skiing going into Saturday’s race on a hill she loves.
    “It’s my favorite place to race. It’s the most technical hill on the women’s circuit, especially for super G, which we don’t have here this year,” she said.  
    Ludlow will race in the cast for at least the next six weeks to allow for her broken thumb to heal. The fracture occurred at the base of her thumb, and a piece of bone was dislodged. If the bones don’t heal properly, Ludlow faces surgery in six weeks. For now, she’ll endure weekly X-rays of the fracture.
    The injury happened Nov. 17 at Keystone during Ludlow’s final GS training run of the U.S. team’s prep period. In a horrifying scene, Ludlow cartwheeled over a net and into the trees lining the course, flying 30 feet into the forest. She said she’s never been so scared while skiing.
    “I was so far into the trees I didn’t know where my coaches were. I fully freaked out, I was screaming my head off,” she said. “Falling sucks. You know you’re going to hurt yourself sometimes, but I’ve never been falling and thought I was going to die.”