Ruiz-Castillo grabs first career victory, Innerhofer wins again in Garmisch

It's never easy to compete at the best of your mental attitude just one week from the ending of the most important even of the season, but that's ski WC and girls and guys had to be ready for their "routine" to start again as after the medals of the World Championships, it was time to battle for the crystal globes once again.

Sun shines for Carolina in Meribel

A very beautiful day, sunny and very cold temperature were the perfect scenario for the comeback of World Cup to the snows of Meribel after 9 years of absence. The slope was very well prepared and the course funny despite being not very challenging.
The early numbers didn't seem to be able to challenge the big names who were to come and so it was until French specialist of speed Marie Marchand-Arvier finished her run with an impressive time and an enormous lead over all the other girls at the moment (she was bib 9). If in the top part where gliding was the main tool to exploit the gaps where always very small, no-one seemed to be able to challenge the time of the French girl from the middle section to the very end, where a perfectly done last turn gave her a terrific speed to finish the race.
All the athletes were losing little by little enough to make their time worse than Marie's and even the first girls in the top group weren't able to challenge her.

It seemed that the first win in world cup for Marchand-Arvier was set to happen, but Maria Riesch had other ideas in her mind: she started pretty slow and among the girls in the top group she got the worst time in the early sections, but with very smooth moves she painted great lines in the middle steep part and made up all her gap and took a solid lead over Marie and in the end crossed the line just one hundred ahead of her.
Best time in the first training Tina Maze as usual suffered the gliding section on top, but bettered the turns of Riesch to try recovering her disadvantage but in the end it wasn't enough as those 8 hundreds relegated her to the temporary 3rd place.
Once again race seemed to be over with the girls after the first group being unable to come close to the times of the podium, but bib n°28, Spanish veteran Carolina Ruiz-Castillo immediately made the crowd well-aware that it wasn't over, not yet: in the first two sections she was the fastest and her lead was impressive, fast and accurate Caroline drew great lines in the turns of the middle section and launched the final section with a great speed which was worth of the best time.

For the Spanish it was the first victory in World Cup, the second podium after the 2nd place in GS in Sestriere 13 years ago. Carolina's win doesn't come as a surprise though as she was very close to the podium few weeks ago in Cortina (4th) and had scored great times in the training. Her joy at the finish area was a great moment for all the fans of skiing as they (and also many other girls of the tour) know the amazing person she is and how much deserved this victory was.
Quite immediately after another girl who had made her name big in the trainings got an impressive result as Regina Sterz finished 5th equalling her best result in World Cup.

Another Italian Victory in speed races

If we do not consider the world championships, this is the 4th downhill of the year where an Italian is jumping on the highest step of the podium after the win of Innerhofer in Beaver Creek and the back to back wins of Paris in Wengen and Kitz, Christof won the historical downhill of Garmisch P.K. even though this year, due to the big snowfall, it was held on a shorter track.
Slovenian "specialist" of the so called classic downhills, Slovenian Andrej Sporn, with bib number 2 scored a terrific time, by exploiting his gliding attitude in the very long flat section that followed the start. The Slovenian wasn't very lucky as the course was still "dirty" from some fresh snow, hence not as fast as it later would have been and most of all later a pale sun improved the visibility on the course. Nonetheless his time seemed unbreakable for a very long while and not even Downhill leader Dominik Paris could as he finished just a bunch of hundreds behind him (the two would finish 7th and 8th by the end).

First one to stop the Slovenian leadership was Austrian Hannes Reichelt, whose awesome first part was confirmed by a very solid choice of lines in the middle section and all that was worth of the temporary leadership. It didn't last long though, because immediately afterwards it was Innerhofer's moment and the Italian's love for the slope (where he won 3 medals at the world championships just 2 years ago) was enough of a good reason to believe he would have done well and so it was.
Despite a couple of mistakes that seemed they could ruin his time, Christof was amazing in the late section where he made almost all the advantage he had at the end over Reichelt.
The better visibility didn't prevent Svindal to fall in the traps of the waves of the middle section and those mistakes would cost him the podium as he finished 5th in end, right behind Reichelt. In any case, thanks to this placement he could overtake Paris in the leadership of the discipline.
Two Austrians completed the podium behind Innerhofer as Klaus Kroell made a very similar race to the one of the Italian but in the end a bunch of hundreds set him behind him and later (with bib 30)  Georg Streitberger scored his first podium in WC in downhill, after the 4 he scored in superg.
Very good surprises came from outside the top 30 as German youngester Josef Ferstl made his first top 10 result (9th) with bib 39, just ahead of Johannes Kroell (bib 35), while French guy Muzaton finished 13th with bib 50!

Italians tame the Birds of Prey

Christof on the top of a very Norse podium.

The Birds of Prey is known as one of the most difficult slopes for speed races in the WC because of its unique mix of flat parts and the famous steep and its waves. Because of the lack of snow and therefore, the bigger jumps, the course setter decided to try and slow down the course.
Sadly, despite its success in making the jumps relatively easier, one guy still got injured: Tobias Stechert from Germany was one of the first runners on course and he was skiing a very convincing run until he finished long in one of the trasverses set on the steep and in the attempt of recovering from that mistake he got his knee's ligaments torn.

After the long break it needed to take the German safely away from the course, Austrian Georg Streitberger with bib number 6 and immediatly after Peter Fill scored two very solid runs and started to lead the race.
Italian Innerhofer, despite the low number, was reported to be on a very good condition and he didn't fail to prove the rumors right. He found a very good feeling with his skis in the gliding part on top and then painted amazing lines down the steep middle part of the Beaver Creek's course.
None seemed to be able to ski anywhere close to the Italian until Kjetil Jansrud with bib 14 showed a great feeling with the snow and the course and he was making up the gap he had from Christof and seemed set to better the Italian time, but a sudden and unexpected mistake on one of the last waves and that cost him the chance of taking the lead - he would finish 3rd eventually.
The big favourite for the race was surely Svindal, the Norse came here with the impressive wins in Lake Louise last weekend and he indeed started to ski a great run by exploiting his great power even on the more technical passages. He kept staying very close to Innerhofer throughtout the course, but by the end as like as his team-mate a mistake cost him the chance of winning the race, finishing incredibly close, but still 2nd.
The top 5 finishers were completed by Austrian surprise Florian Scheiber, that could finish 4th with a big as high as 42! 5th placement for another Italian, Dominik Paris.

Marsaglia makes a win out his first podium

Matteo Marsaglia had shown bright sparkles of talent in the past few years, but so far he had never menaged to score a run errorless or worth of his abilities. In a race that again was sadly signed by another crash and the injury of a racer in the early runs (Austrian hope Max Franz lost consciousness on the crash, but apparently he's already well), out of the first names, only Italian Werner Hell had done an errorless run -he would finish 5th-, as the tricks set by the course-setter were many and it was very hard to find the right lines and the right attitude towards such a difficult slope.
Then it was Austrian Reichelt's turn and he didn't let the thought of his friend's injury get into his mind and found the right motivation and corague to attack this slope, probably angry for a good result after the bad ones of the last speed races. Reichelt took the lead over the Italian and kept his place on top for a few more runners, as long as another Italian, Matteo Marsaglia, took the lead over him. Matteo was coming from a couple of very convincing results in GS and he showed his great form by looking effortlessly painting lines, rahter than skiing down an iced hill.
If being ahead of such an inspired Reichelt wasn't enough of a proof of the greatness of his run, one by one all the specialists of the discipline started to fall behind his back whenever they crossed the finishline.
Once again the Norwegian team mated looked ready to trouble the Italian leadership, but in some sort of re-happening of yesterday's plot both Jansrud and Svindal couldn't but make a mistake that would cost them too much for the win: Kjetil this time not even making it to the podium, only 6th, whilst Aksel-Lund didn't change his placement of the day before, ending up 2nd.
Italian Peter Fill wanted to leave his sign on the race too and made a promising start by scoring the best time in the upper part, but due to a bad line-choice he went out right away.
4th in the end was Ted Ligety, who seemed to have worked hard on the discipline, by proving his Lake Louise's great placement wasn't a fluke and this run can't but put him the heavy favourite target for tomorrow's GS.