Altenmarkt & Val

Two races with equal magnitude and high expectation saw great results for the British racers. After the high winds and freak conditions witnessed in North America, the sun came out to welcome back the crème de la crème of World Skiing. The men started the day off in Val d'Isere and straight after that the Women took centre stage in Altenmarkt.

The lack of a second training run for the Premier Neige, the opening European Downhill of the season, meant that Finlay Mickel would have to rely on his World Cup Starting List position and not the expected form he has been showing to lift him into the elite first thirty starters. The talk all season has been of getting a top twenty result and despite the superb run of Werner Franz (from start number 2) the rest of the star names seemed to lose their way. Bode Miller, so dominant in North America could finish "only" 4th, after leading at an early split, Hermann Maier, well this was a day he will want to forget. Having lost his great adversary, he finds himself being upstaged by another Atomic racer now: Finlay Mickel! Finlay has grabbed another scalp in beating the great Austrian. Alongside Maier, Aamodt and Ghedina also found themselves trailing Edinburgh's finest!

Mickel is looking much better in the gliding sections, the result of a lot of hard work over the summer and with Val Gardena a gliding course, this bodes well! Hard work and lot of encouragement from Mark Tilston, Performance Director, are now seeing the benefits for Mickel.

With his 24th secured, attention passed over to see if Chemmy Alcott could match, better or produce similar, not that they are a competitive lot this British team! Having been knocked out of the first thirty starters after the disappointing race in Lake Louise, Chemmy was back in the pack for the Super G. Three runners before Chemmy went a French racer crashed heavily into the barriers causing a long delay. With this delay, supporters of Alex Meissnitzer, leader at the time and who went on to win, started celebrating. The drunken singing momentarily knocked Chemmy but she is strong enough now to focus on the job in hand and attacked the course. Mistakes came but so to did the speed and although at one stage it looked like she was heading out like many other top names, she just held it together and stood 22nd when she came through the finish.

while it looked like she would better Finley's result, two late finishes, Tina Maze finishing third after having lead from start number 64 being the most exceptional, knocked her down to 24th, equal with Finlay. Most would look disappointed with this but Chemmy relaxed when she quickly realised that this meant that she would remain out of the top 30, this starting later. Chemmy was more upset for her friend American Caroline Lalive who dropped off the podium!

Two great races that saw some unexpected name score great results: Marco Buechel finished second in the Men's downhill and lots of the technical specialists in the girls race taking part with success: Tanya Poutiainen taking 30th and a valuable point towards the overall title. Lucia Recchia of Italy looked like scoring a great win before Meissnitzer cruelly deprived her of a famous win.