U.S. women ready their tucks for St. Moritz

U.S. alpine women’s head coach Jim Tracy thinks of St. Moritz as the aerodynamics stop on the World Cup tour. The women’s team puts its tucking, terrain and speed-holding skills to the test this weekend, beginning with a super-combined (super-G and slalom) race Friday, downhill Saturday and super G Sunday.
 

The Swiss resort has received almost five feet of snow over the last week, and inclement weather shut down Thursday’s second downhill training run.

“We train in flat light, but here, it’s all above tree line the whole entire course,” Tracy said. “If it’s cloudy, it becomes challenging when the light gets flat. There’s only two jumps, a lot of rolls and gullies. If the light is not good, it changes the whole character of the course. It becomes super challenging.”
 

Though coaches and racers say St. Moritz course crews have done a phenomenal job clearing and maintaining the course over the last few days, the consistency of snow is different than the first couple of World Cup stops this season.
 

“Lake Louise has a steep section and it’s icy, but here, they always have the snow like, winter grippy and completely buff,” said Stacey Cook, who will be the first American down the course Friday, starting sixth in the first run of the super-combined. “We switch modes here. There’s a lot of terrain and you can’t ever take a break. You can’t let anything slip, because the minute you let something slip, it’s not going to be close.”
 

Cook also pointed out that American women who have historically found success on the St. Moritz course – Kirsten Lee Clark and Jonna Mendes taking silver and bronze, respectively, in the 2003 world championship super G – have put down their speed at the top of the course.
 

“They said you’d always win it at the top split,” Cook said. “You gotta get it going from the beginning.”
 

Lindsay Vonn had the best U.S. downhill training run result, finishing 12^th Wednesday and 11^th Thrusday before the remainder of the run was called off due to high winds.
 

She called the training runs “cruisers” and other racers echoed that, while good practice, training results don’t mean much. What will mean everything is whether they can reach speed early and maintain it.
 

“Aerodynamics have a lot to do with this course,” Tracy said. “At the top especially. The first two gates are kind of steep, then for 60 seconds or so, you have to be very dynamic and you have to execute good lines. You come into areas of a lot of terrain. It’s not a super difficult downhill, but it’s going to be one that will be fairly tight. You have to carry your speed and be precise.”
 

U.S. racer Keely Kelleher is a fan of this style of course and understands the formula. “You just have to be on it – on top of your skis,” she said after Wednesday’s training run. “There’s some sweet jumps and it flows really well. It has some big, airplane turns where you can be subtle yet agressive and just lay it over.”