Beaver Creek: Bode Miller fastest in DH; Ligety, Nyman in contention for super combi podium

Americans set themselves up for significant podium potential Thursday with strong results in the downhill portion of the Birds of Prey World Cup super combined, the opening race of the Visa Birds of Prey four-event stop.
    Bode Miller, after struggling to find speed on his new Head skis in Lake Louise last weekend, jolted the overflow partisan crowd with a first-place run of 1 minute, 13.06 seconds, nearly half a second faster than Austrian’s Christoph Gruber in second. Unofficially, Steven Nyman secured seventh, and slalom standout Ted Ligety was in terrific shape after skiing to 16th in the downhill. Ligety is one of the few grade-A slalom skiers in the top 20, so he has an excellent shot at returning to the Beaver Creek podium. Last winter, Ligety was third in slalom here for his first career World Cup podium.

BEAVER CREEK, Colorado — Americans set themselves up for significant podium potential Thursday with strong results in the downhill portion of the Birds of Prey World Cup super combined, the opening race of the Visa Birds of Prey four-event stop.
    Bode Miller, after struggling to find speed on his new Head skis in Lake Louise last weekend, jolted the overflow partisan crowd with a first-place run of 1 minute, 13.06 seconds, nearly half a second faster than Austrian’s Christoph Gruber in second. "It was a lot of fun," Miller beamed in the finish corral.
    'It was a great run. I finally brought it down,'' Miller said. ''The jumps were pretty big and I got some big air. It was fun.
    ''Now it's up to my slalom performance,'' he added with a grin.  
    Though he rarely crashes out these days, Miller is famous for failing to finish the technical events. Last season, he finished just two of eight slaloms.
    Unofficially, Steven Nyman secured seventh, and slalom standout Ted Ligety was in terrific shape after skiing to 16th in the downhill. Ligety is one of the few grade-A slalom skiers in the top 20, so he has an excellent shot at returning to the Beaver Creek podium. Last winter, Ligety was third in slalom here for his first career World Cup podium.
    "With my hand injury, it's been tough to get training in, but I'm starting to feel more comfortable every day [in downhill]," Ligety said. The 2006 Olympic combined gold medalist suffered a diagonal fracture to the second metacarpal bone (index finger) on his right hand when he hit it on a gate while training on the Pitztal glacier in Austria in October.
    Normally clean-shaven Ligety sported a fake mustache over his taped face. “It’s so cold out here I had to tape my face so I wouldn’t get frostbite, so I had the idea [to paint a mustache] so I wouldn’t look like every other guys in goggles,” he said.
    Goggles? Ligety also is sporting his new signature line of goggles, Shred. Do they help him ski faster than his old ones? “For sure! I was like four seconds out in all the downhills last year,” he said.
    “I’ve been training a lot of speed and I felt really good down in Chile. I was training with the speed guys.”   
    Swiss downhill veteran Didier Cuche had been listed as third but was later disqualified for missing the 29th gate. John Kucera, the winner of a super G in Canada last week, was also disqualified for missing the same gate. The Canadian team has launched a protest.
    Gruber was second, .41 back, followed by Austria's Mario Scheiber, Liechtenstein's Marco Buechel, Swiss skier Didier Defago and Austrian Michael Walchhofer. Austrian Benni Raich, the combined champ from last season, was 32nd, 2.60 back, but he should make up plenty of time in his slalom. Other Americans were Marco Sullivan in 22nd and Scott Macartney 30th (later disqualified).
    Of the top 15 skiers in slalom points last season, only Raich (32nd in DH), Austrian Rainer Schoenfelder (34th), teammate Romed Baumann (29th) and Swiss skier Silvan Zurbriggren (14th) appeared able to make a dent in the top 10.
    Last season at Birds of Prey, Miller and Daron Rahlves went 1-2 in giant slalom, and in the downhill, Rahlves won with Miller second. Miller has four career podiums at Beaver Creek. In 2004, he won a downhill and was second in super G. He was third twice last season in super combined, the first year of the event, taking third in Val d'Isere and Wengen.
    One of the few World Cuppers talented enough in both slalom and downhill to contend, Miller also has done well in the traditional combined, which combined a downhill run with two runs of slalom. In combined, Miller has won twice (Kitzbühel, Chamonix in 2004) and taking second three times (Kitzbühel 2006, Wengen 2002 and 2003).
    On a beautiful but frigid day with blue skis, the Bernhard Russi-designed Beaver Creek track was running very fast, with racers gaining huge air off the Golden Eagle Jump on the lower half of the course.
    Super combined debuted on the World Cup circuit last season, and this season will be the first time FIS awards a crystal globe to the discipline winner. The event combined one shortened downhill run with one run of slalom on the same day. Thursday's second run was set for 2:30 p.m., with a reverse running of the top 30 racers, followed by the rest of the pack out of contention.
    Macartney was not happy with his outcome. “The course is getting a little wavy from all the slipping. I was having a pretty good run up top, then got a little off and landed on a wave and got thrown off course. Lame, I’d call it,” Macartney said. “I was really looking forward to skiing some slalom, too. Now I’ll probably go and ride the bike for a while and come back tomorrow."
    Canadian Francois Bourque, ninth to lead the Canadians, said, “For sure I was trying to go as fast as I can in downhill because slalom is maybe not my force as much as downhill. I’m up there and anything can happen, so I’m going to focus and go for it.”
    Canadian John Kucera, winner of last weekend’s Lake Louise super G, was 27th Thursday in the DH portion, then was disqualified, but the Canadians were protesting. “The technical portion really helps the slalom skiers, they’re good technical skiers,” he said. “Downhill skiers, we have more of an edge on the more open stuff. It’ll be a really good combined, I think.”
    He also said he liked the super combi format. “I think in the super combined it’s way more even. In the regular combined with the two runs of slalom, it’s a huge advantage for the slalom skiers. I think in the super combined it makes it more of an even race.”
    Versus, formerly OLN, will broadcast coverage of the super combined Dec. 10 from 5-6 p.m. ET.

— Ski Racing's Sam Flickinger, Hank McKee and Hilary Lund contributed to this report