The Reiteralm Giant Slalom races gave the racers in the field a taste of the future. The huge men's field with some prominent names in it gave the racers something to aim at. The only downer for those racing was that the large field meant that the race did not finish until late in the day. The fact that the hill was relatively flat allowed the race to continue with caution.
Having made the journey across from the World Cup Slalom in Santa Caterina, Alex Tilley, produced a race winning performance in the girls race. While a number of the early girls crashed on the run into the finish, Tilley put in an assured performance to take the race win, though it was close after Russian Kristina Kryukova almost stole it on the second run, Tilley won by just six-hundredths of a second.
Ambition's Alice Macaulay was second best of the Brits but some way behind Tilley. Yasmin Cooper (Evolution) put in another strong performance that saw her ahead of Macaulay after the first run before making an error that saw her drop down the leaderboard. Cooper was still next best of the British female racers.
In the men's race, much was hoped of Charlie Raposo (Global Racing) starting at the business end of the race but he crashed out on the first run near the bottom of the course. Jack Gower, starting 39 placed 41st as best of the British. Gower will have better days at the office though his second run saw an improvement. Max Baggio (Evolution) had been ahead of Gower after the first run but could not live with the pace of Gower on the second run and dropped below him with Paul Henderson (Ambition) taking the third best British result. Baggio was in 52nd and Henderson in 63rd spot.
Canadian Tyler Werry took the top spot in the men's race. Rising Austrian World Cup racer Johannes Kroell started 72 to finish seventh while another of the rising young Austrians, Frederic Berthold started 140th of the 187 starters and finished in 40th place. With constant slope clearing, the race course held up despite large numbers of racers in the race.
There is a quote by Heinrich Heine "Experience is a good school but the fees are high," that many of the young racers will understand from this race. Sometimes you have to do the hard race to get the experience to do better in other races.
Female results
Male results
Picture: Jack Gower competing at Reiteralm. Credit Racer Ready - all rights reserved.
More pictures are on www.racer-ready.ifp3.com