Odermatt wins World Cup GS to end 10-year Swiss drought

SANTA CATERINA VULFURVA, Italy (AP) — Marco Odermatt won a men’s World Cup giant slalom on Monday, becoming the first Swiss skier in nearly 10 years to win a race in the discipline.

Odermatt held on to his first-run lead to beat American racer Tommy Ford by 0.73 seconds.

Filip Zubcic, who won Saturday’s race in dense snowfall, was 1.25 seconds off the lead and outside the top 20 after the opening run but the Croatian skier posted the fastest time in the second run to place third, 0.75 behind.

Odermatt became the first Swiss GS winner since Carlo Janka, who was the reigning overall champion when he won in Kranjska Gora, Slovenia, in March 2011.

Since Janka’s triumph, the Swiss team went without a podium result in the discipline for seven seasons, before Odermatt, Loic Meillard, Gino Caviezel and Thomas Tumler all scored top-three results since the 2018-19 season.

Odermatt’s second career win came one year and a day after he triumphed in a super-G in Beaver Creek, Colorado.

The two-time junior world champion in GS, who was on the podium in both previous races this season, leads the discipline standings and joined Alexis Pinturault on top of the overall standings.

Pinturault was 0.82 behind in fifth, just behind Meillard in fourth.

The race was rescheduled from Sunday, when heavy snow in the Italian Alps made the race impossible.

Conditions improved overnight, with low temperatures hardening the surface of the course.

The event was moved from Val d’Isere because of lack of snow in the French resort.

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