This was a brutal run. This is the hardest track on the Men's Giant Slalom tour. It rolls, it drops and then just when you think you are home you have a 60 degree drop into the finish that saps what ever energy you have left. Sometimes it can feel as though it is survival of the fittest. With this in mind it is Marco Odermatt that leads after the first run with Alexis Pinturault in second 0.31 back and Filip Zubcic in third, half a second back. The top five are rounded out by Mathieu Faivre and Manuel Feller.
The combination of the fast turns, the changing weather condition that affected the snow composition in the lead up to the race and then this being the last Giant Slalom before the Olympics, created a fascinating first run.
Odermatt was good. He did what was expected of him. He has won three of the four races so far this season and is quite rightly the racer to beat. Pinturault did a good run but a small mistake as he came into the finish pitch cost him dearly. Sometimes when a race bounces, they do not lose much time. When you bounce and the gradient is 60 degrees, you drop down the hill rapidly and lose time when you have to jam on the brakes.
With the gap to 30th a significant 4.39 seconds, how the early racers react to the course could see some of the early racers move up the results.
Some big names are missing from the second run including Luca di Aliprandini who was absolutely flying when he straddled a gate at speed but skied away gingerly after extracting himself from the netting and fresh snow at the side of the course.
Lucas Braathen was another to pull up just at the top of the steep pitch into the finish. After the race Braathen explained that he was concerned about injuring his knee again with the pressure required down the steep.
For Charlie Raposo, he put in some quality turns at the top of the course but a slightly wide line at the approach to the steep pitch saw his chances of making the second run disappear. These were brutal conditions and it was no surprise seeing the number of racers not make the finish. The five racers prior to Raposo all failed to negotiate the bumps and ruts.
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