Photo: GEPA pictures.

The weather was a challenge in St Moritz. Visibility was terrible, and the surface was rough. However, the women raced. The shortened course produced times 20 seconds less than the entire course, but the challenge was equally difficult or more. This race is the type of day the adrenaline junkies get their fix. Goggia likes to say only the brave. 

Three hard-skiing athletes earned their place on the podium, but what an excellent day for stories.

Two Italians topped the results, with Elena Curtoni finishing first and Sofia Goggia second. Also the Swiss athlete Corinne Suter joined the Italian women on the podium in third, 0.73 seconds behind Suter. 

This was Curtoni’s fourth career downhill podium and her second victory. It is also the fourth consecutive Suter podium this season.

Nine racers had started when Sofia Goggia entered the start, then a delay occurred when a course worker had issues and needed help to get to a safe place. Did the delay shake the champion? No possible way. But for the first time this season in downhill when she crossed the finish, she wasn’t in the lead.

Goggia’s teammate Elena Curtoni who ran with bib two remained in the leader’s chair and stayed for the entire race. However, at only 0.29 seconds behind, Goggia might have had an extra challenge; she had seriously injured her hand on the third gate.

While bruising, potentially breaking a hand at the top of the course and finishing second is impressive, it doesn’t overshadow the hard-charging run of Goggia’s teammate Curtoni. You could see every woman’s legs shaking in the bumps, and the faster they were, the more intense the rattling. Fighting the challenging conditions, she fully committed to arcing her skis and kept looking for speed. Running second, she crossed in first and never relinquished the lead.

It was a similar scenario to when Curtoni won her previous race in Cortina d’Ampezzo last season when Goggia crashed two weeks before the Beijing Olympics.

“It’s too bad, because it would be great to share the celebration and anthem with her,” Curtoni said. “It seems like a curse when I win that something happens to her. I’m not doing it on purpose, I swear.”

There is inspiring news for the USA squad. The first two racers on the day are Italian. Also, third and fourth place went to Switzerland. However, USA’s Breezy Johnson and Mikaela Shiffrin finished fifth and sixth. Additionally, four out of six US women finished in the points.

USA’s bib eight, Breezy Johnson, has made another step toward her return to the podium. Growing up skiing hard on a big mountain and tough conditions prepared her to race in today’s challenge. Skiing with bib eight, Johnson crossed in fourth and finished fifth on the day, 0,96 seconds behind the winner Curtoni. 

Mikaela Shiffrin wasn’t as fast as Johnson, but she was terrific. St Moritz is Shiffrin’s first downhill of the season, and conditions were challenging, yet she charged to the bottom. Only 0.27 seconds behind her teammate, Shiffrin finished the day sixth. 

“Yesterday was a bit difficult, so I’m really quite happy with this result,” said Shiffrin. “I was just trying to be strong with my skiing. I was just on the right line, nothing crazy, and that was enough to be top ten today.”

“If you know me, I would always like to be on the top step, thats for sure. But, I also have to be realistic with how I can ski downhill, I would say my limit is probably a bit lower than the women here who are really a top four and they are going to risk more and they are going to be able to handle it better.”

Notably, after years of trying, Tricia Mangan scored her first non-alpine combined World Cup points by finishing a very respectable tie for 17th.

However, the last racer to ski, in only her second World Cup, first in Europe, was Lauren Macuga. The Park City skier with a very positive attitude crossed in 30th and scored a single point, but what a way to start her career and her season. 

Bella Wright had a few mistakes in her run, resulting in a DNF, though she was able to stay on her feet.

“I went out there and just really tried to give it my all and send it, I felt like I was really going for it – maybe too many mistakes here and there. But overall I’m happy with my attack and didn’t hold back in these conditions,” said Wright. “So I’m going to try to bring that skiing into tomorrow and hopefully make it to the finish.”

Canada’s Marie-Michele Gagnon scored with solid splits throughout the course and some of the worst light of the race and finished one place in front of the young Macuga. Five North Americans in the points with two more starts on the same hill provides exciting potential. 

Analysis of the top three and North Americans in the top 30 and top 30 results

Top 30 results downhill St Moritz December 16th

The Associated Press and USST contributed to this report.