Ski check: exciting stories at the World Cup: Wengen magic, a bloody kiss and Gut-Behrami’s hat trick

Mathias Germann And Marcel W. Perren

The top officials of the Lauberhorn OK and Swiss Ski are very angry after the first training on the world’s longest downhill, as many athletes publicly spoke out against three speed races in three days. What happens then proves that the critics of the monster program are absolutely right: with Alexis Pinturault (Fr, 32, torn cruciate ligament in Super-G) and Aleksander Aamodt Kilde (who suffered a deep cut in his lower leg and a dislocated shoulder during the original descent ), two top stars are flying so fast that they are canceled for the rest of the season. The Bernese Oberlander Marco Kohler, who started this downhill winter promisingly with an 8th place in Val Gardena (It) and a 10th place in Bormio (It), tore his cruciate ligament on Thursday in the shortened descent. FIS race director Markus Waldner announces consequences after this series of injuries: “The racing program here was clearly overloaded, we will never reschedule a race here in the future that was canceled as in this case in Beaver Creek. At least not as long as I am race director.”

The Austrians make merciless use of their home advantage in Zauchensee – they trained on the track for three days – and achieve a series of podium finishes. The result? They turned the 99-point deficit behind Switzerland in the women’s country rankings into a 10-point lead. On Sunday, Lara Gut-Behrami spits in their soup and wins the Super-G. And: our neighboring country is generous! Because Gut-Behrami had the lowest total time over all three races (4:15.42 minutes), she received a voucher: “One week of summer holiday for two people in St. Anton am Arlberg.” Will she and her husband cash in in 2024? She was already hoarding a voucher in 2021 and 2022. Now she has the holiday hat trick.

More about the Lauberhorn Race

Feuz and Hofmann in action

“So incredibly beautiful and so incredibly difficult”

Curious incident

Odermatt has his jacket thrown to him during the awards ceremony

“Should be a lesson”

Critical voices after many crashes in Wengen

The day after his frightening departure from Ziel-S, Kilde publishes a special love selfie from the hospital: While the Norwegian lies in bed hanging from the pipes with traces of blood on his face, his girlfriend Mikaela Shiffrin (28) presses a kiss on his forehead. The record World Cup winner decided not to participate in the World Cup competitions in Zauchensee and instead went to Bern, where her true love has been stationed since Saturday. “I’m being cared for here by the one and only Mikaela Shiffrin. And I got patched up,” Kilde writes on his Instagram channel and thanks his fan base for the “many beautiful, encouraging words.” “This sport can be so cruel, but I still love it.” In plain language, this means: the 31-year-old will attack passionately again next winter.

Sofia Goggia (31) is and remains the undisputed downhill queen. She wins on Saturday with confidence and reconciles herself with the Kälberloch route, which she has already flown several times. Reason for joy? Certainly! But: About an hour after reaching her destination, the wild Italian howled uncontrollably. “They weren’t tears of joy,” she says. And: “I’m not allowed to say certain things.” Apparently Goggia sent her Kondi trainer into the desert a week ago – the divorce seems to have left its mark.

The genius of Marco Odermatt (26) is especially evident in the infamous Brüggli-S. While Aleksander Aamodt Kilde was victorious on the Lauberhorn last year, even though he entered the Stemmbogen at the entrance to the Brüggli, the Nidwalden resident rides through this passage at full speed. And that is why there is currently only one athlete who can compete with the two-time overall World Cup winner in the speed disciplines: the Frenchman Cyprien Sarrazin (29) won the Lauberhorn Super-G for Odermatt. In the two descents, the magician from Lake Lucerne relegated the wild daredevil from southeastern France to the place of honor. Especially because of the magical line in the Brüggli-S.

Franjo von Allmen (22) from Obersimmental faces a lot of frustration and happiness during his Lauberhorn debut. In Thursday’s shortened descent, the 22-year-old had the tenth best split time, because his teammate Marco Kohler had a heavy crash approaching the Haneggschuss. Before the trained carpenter is flown back to the start in the helicopter, Beat Feuz on SRF doubts whether there will be a happy ending for FvA: “Franjo will be happy with the short helicopter flight, but something like that throws a young athlete completely out of rhythm. And the edges of his skis won’t be as good the second time he starts.”

But under these brutal conditions, Von Allmen proves that he has incredible potential: he finishes in 14th place. 24 hours later, Franjo feels a pinch in his knee after the Super-G fall! There is suddenly a question mark behind his start in the original descent. Does the season even end early? On the contrary! Von Allmen also overcame this setback in record speed and finished 14th again on Saturday. Since Allmen’s hometown of Boltigen BE is only 53 kilometers away from Wengen, many friends and family members are cheering him on from the stands. Franjo’s fans call themselves “Franatics”.

Ski Kiwi Alice Robinson (22) is often called a rubber ball or kamikaze rider. The New Zealander not only has a wild driving style, but also a sense of humor. After kissing the snow during a fall during training for the Zauchensee descent, she posts a photo with a bloody nose and a swollen lower lip. “Natural Botox,” she writes underneath. Things don’t go well in the races, she participates in the two Super-Gs and comes 25th and 21st.