CORTINA D’AMPEZZO. The Olympia delle Tofane slope, usually the setting for women’s competitions, is instead new for the entire men’s sector. The slope changes, but not the challenge at the top, which once again sees Marco Odermatt as protagonists, who returned after the alarm for his knee, and Aleksander Aamodt Kilde. They are the ones who occupy the first two positions of the super-G in Cortina d’Ampezzo, with a Mattia Casse who is back once again on the podium of the World Cup.
It is the third of his career, the first in this discipline. Another showdown for the blue who often had to stop due to more or less serious injuries. The Italy of speed clings to him, capable once again of skiing a very high-level test and of interpreting a non-trivial track in the best possible way, which has led many athletes to make mistakes. Casse closed at 49/100 from the top, occupied by the Swiss Odermatt, a phenomenon capable of winning in every discipline, except for slalom, where he himself doesn’t compete. He stopped for a few days (he jumped Schladming’s giant) due to a knee problem that he managed to resolve – even if not completely – in a very short time. He returned to the starting gate this morning for yet another challenge with Aleksander Aamodt Kilde, who today had to give up 35/100.
«An increasingly solid season, that’s what I look for every day – says Casse -. In such a setting it is nice to compete, to make the podium even more, even more so in super-G, a discipline in which I started to go strong in the World Cup». Nothing to do for Dominik Paris, who makes a lot of mistakes when the corners become more closed. The upper part was good, then the race compromised: he is out of the top thirty positions. «He doesn’t turn, a little is better but until I can take a moto down to the finish, it doesn’t make sense».
Bad fall for Christof Innerhofer, who misses on the penultimate jump and ends up in the nets. No help is needed, the South Tyrolean got up and reached the finish line on his own legs. Capital proof of Matteo Marsaglia, often with back pain, who hits a beautiful tenth position, just under a second from the top. However, the other blues are far away.