|
 |   |
EVENTS Fantasy Central Inside Game Video Plus Statitudes Your Turn Message Boards Email Newsletters Golf Guide Cities 
CNNSI.com GROUP
COMMERCE
|  |
Red hot Sonja Nef wins her second giant slalom of season
SESTRIERE, Italy (AP) -- Sonja Nef definitely adores the Sestriere ski course. On Tuesday, the 28-year-old Swiss skier from Grub captured a women's World Cup giant slalom race to improve her career record to six wins -- a half achieved in this Italian Alpine resort. "I like this course very much, because you can let your skis run," Nef said after edging Sweden's Anja Paerson by 0.24 seconds in the combined two-run time. "Another reason, it that I have learned to put two good runs together. I usually pile up big gaps in the first run. This time I told myself, ski the first run as if it were the second. It paid off," Nef added. Tuesday's victory here was her second in GS this season, after Park City. It added to a slalom win in Sestriere in 1996 and three GS wins last season, one here. The Swiss skier, second to Paerson by 0.24 in the first run, charged down the icy Sises course to set up a winning time of two minutes, 21.67 seconds and beat the Swede by the same margin. Paerson, on her fourth podium finish in as many GS races this season, ended in 2:21.91. She retained the lead in the GS points table and said that winning the GS title was her priority this season. "The World Cup finals are at home (in Are, in March) and I hope to win the (GS) title there," Paerson said. The Swede conceded that she felt the pressure in the second run. "I was very tense and I did not ski as well as in the first run... I am satisfied with the second place after all," she said. In the GS standings Paerson leads Nef by only four points, 280 to 276. Defending World Cup champion Renate Goetschl of Austria placed third, with a gap of 0.35 from the winner. It was the first podium finish in GS for Goetschl, a specialist of speed races who came from Sunday's downhill victory in St. Moritz, Switzerland. World Cup leader Martina Ertl of Germany came in fourth to stay atop the overall table with 610 points. France's Regine Cavagnoud held second place with 538 ahead of Dorfmeister (523) and Goetschl (499). Ertl edged by one hundredth of a second Austrian Michaela Dorfmeister, winner of the previous GS race here on December 9. Young Canadian Britt Janyk, only 29th after the first run, clocked the fastest second run in 1:10.54 -- more than one second faster than Nef -- to climb to eighth place in the combined time of 2:23.49. Croatian teenage star Janica Kostelic placed 10th. Kostelic will be the woman to beat in Wednesday's slalom in which she will be shooting for her fourth consecutive slalom win this season. Kristina Koznick, the best American finisher in 20th place Tuesday, was likely to do much better in slalom, her favorite discipline. This week's races were moved to Sestriere from Jasna for lack of snow in the Slovak venue. Several December races of the World Cup program have been rescheduled because of adverse weather condition.
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
