Lenzerheide: Hosp blisters field in 1st run of GS

LENZERHEIDE, Switzerland — Austrian Nicole Hosp, trying to complete a come-from-behind overall World Cup championship, overwhelmed the field in the first run of a women’s giant slalom Sunday at World Cup Finals.
    Hosp, who seized the standings lead from teammate Marlies Schild on Saturday by winning the slalom, clocked a time of 1 minute, 3.10 seconds to best second-place finisher Tanja Poutiainen by a stunning .62 seconds. Italy’s Manuela Moelgg was third, .86 back, while Schild was 10th, 2.01 off Hosp’s pace.    
    American Julia Mancuso, third in the standings, struggled a bit, finishing eighth, 1.39 behind Hosp.
LENZERHEIDE, Switzerland — Austrian Nicole Hosp, trying to complete a come-from-behind overall World Cup championship, overwhelmed the field in the first run of a women’s giant slalom Sunday at World Cup Finals.
    Hosp, who seized the standings lead from teammate Marlies Schild on Saturday by winning the slalom, clocked a time of 1 minute, 3.10 seconds to best second-place finisher Tanja Poutiainen by a stunning .62 seconds. Italy’s Manuela Moelgg was third, .86 back, while Schild was 10th, 2.01 off Hosp’s pace.    
    American Julia Mancuso, third in the standings, struggled a bit, finishing eighth, 1.39 behind Hosp.
    Schild could still win if she finished eighth in the second leg and Hosp went out or finished out of the points.
    Only the top 15 finishers score at the final, instead of the usual top-30 in regular season races. A 15th-place finish is worth 16 points.
    Schild had seemed the favorite for the overall title after doing well earlier this week in the speed events — her weakest disciplines.
    And after winning seven slaloms this season, Schild had been expected to score a large number of points in Saturday’s slalom but twice veered off course and hiked back uphill to re-run the gates to finish out of the points.
    Hosp won the race to grab 100 points and now leads the overall competition with 1,472 points, 30 more than second-place Schild.

— The Associated Press contributed to this report

Lenzerheide women’s World Cup giant salom results
First run
Only top 15 earn points
1. Nicole Hosp, Austria, 1:03.10.
2. Tanja Poutiainen, Finland, 1:03.72.
3. Manuela Moelgg, Italy, 1:03.96.
4. Kathrin Hoelzl, Germany, 1:03.99.
5. Michaela Kirchgasser, Austria, 1:04.25.
6. Nicole Gius, Italy, 1:04.26.
7. Anna Ottosson, Sweden, 1:04.47.
8. Julia Mancuso, United States, 1:04.49.
9. Maria Riesch, Germany, 1:04.95.
10. Marlies Schild, Austria, 1:05.11.
11. Karen Putzer, Italy, 1:05.24.
12. Ingrid Jaquemod, France, 1:05.31.
13. Sarka Zahrobska, Czech Republic, 1:05.42.
14. Elisabeth Goergl, Austria, 1:05.45.
15. Andrea Fischbacher, Austria, 1:05.71.
16. Chemmy Alcott, Britain, 1:05.88.
17. Maria Pietilae-Holmner, Sweden, 1:06.29.
18. Tina Maze, Slovenia, 1:06.61.
19. Emily Brydon, Canada, 1:06.66.
20. Nicole Schmidhofer, Austria, 1:06.82.
21. Genevieve Simard, Canada, 1:06.88.

Did not finish
Anja Paerson, Sweden; Therese Borssen, Sweden; Daniela Zeiser, Austria; Viktoria Rebensburg, Germany.