Story highlights
Lindsey Vonn breaks World Cup downhill record
American skier finishes first in Cortina
Doubles up with super-G victory Sunday
Aksel Lund Svindal season over after Kitzbuhel crash
Lindsey Vonn completed the downhill-super-G double at Cortina d’Ampezzo Sunday to take the overall World Cup lead.
A day after she surpassed Annemarie Moser-Proell’s record for number of wins in downhill events, the unstoppable American claimed her 75th World Cup victory.
She is rapidly closing on the all-time record of 86 by Swedish ski legend Ingemar Stenmark.
It has also taken Vonn 45 points clear in the standings from Swiss Lara Gut, who finished fifth in the super-G.
Vonn powered down the Olympia delle Tofane course at the Italian resort in one minute 26.55 seconds to relegate Liechtenstein’s Tina Weirather to second place.
Germany’s Viktoria Rebensburg completed the podium.
Saturday saw Vonn win her 37th downhill – one more than was achieved by Austria’s Moser-Proell during her 1970s pomp.
Larisa Yurkiw of Canada finished second, 0.28 seconds behind Vonn, while Gut was 0.67 seconds further back in third.
“It’s always tricky with these conditions – the wind was going back and forth,” Vonn told reporters.
“Some people got headwind, some people got tailwind. I’m just really happy to come away with another win and another record,” she added.
The 2010 Olympic downhill champion has now won seven races in the speed events this season, four in downhill and three in super-.,
She leads the standings in those disciplines as she battles Gut for the overall title.
Drama at Kitzbuhel as Svindal season ended
Peter Fill of Italy won the men’s World Cup downhill event in Kitzbuhel, Austria, after hot favorite Aksel Lund Svindal of Norway dramatically crashed out.
Svindal initially appeared fortunate to walk away after veering off course at the Hausberg Kompression turn. But it was later confirmed that the overall World Cup leader had torn knee ligaments and will miss the rest of the season.
Austrian pair Hannes Reichelt and Georg Streitberger had already lost control at the same spot as Svindal earlier in the day.
The sport’s official website reported that Streitberger had also torn knee ligaments and was ruled out for the season after going for immediate surgery. Reichelt, the super-G winner at last year’s world championships, had a less serious diagnosis of bone bruising and is expected to recover in three weeks.
“When you start here, you know it’s really dangerous and you know you need to risk a lot and hope you come down in one piece,” Fill said after just the second World Cup win of his career, in one of alpine skiing’s most famous but daunting races.
There was some consolation for the Norwegian team Sunday when Henrik Kristoffersen claimed his fifth slalom win of the season, edging Austrian Marcel Hirscher with a stunning second leg run.
Sitting only 12th after the first run, 0.83sec off German Fritz Dopfer’s leading pace, the 21-year-old Kristoffersen charged through the field for a combined time of one minute 43.96 seconds.
But Hirscher’s second place takes him to within only 27 points of the stricken Svindal in the overall standings, with Kristoffersen in third place, but with only an outside chance of challenging for the overall crown.