Ski dominator Marco Odermatt won the giant slalom in Palisades Tahoe and thus secured early triumph in the overall World Cup rankings. With the success in the USA on Saturday evening, the Swiss increased his lead in the ranking to more than 1,000 points – meaning that the big crystal ball can no longer be taken away from him mathematically before the last ten races of the winter. The Swiss had already won the overall ranking in the previous two years.
In the ski resort in California, the 26-year-old relegated the Norwegian Henrik Kristoffersen (+0.12 seconds) to second place in a high-class duel. The American River Radamus (1.37) came third to the cheers of the spectators. Odermatt won the tenth World Cup giant slalom in a row. “It was very close today,” said the winner.
In the overall standings he is now 1001 points ahead of the Austrian Manuel Feller, who finished eighth. Due to Odermatt’s performances this season and the injury-related absences of some of his rivals, there has long been no doubt that the Swiss will once again win the big crystal ball as the best of the year. Now this is also mathematically fixed.
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The best German was Alexander Schmid in 15th place (+2.58). On Sunday (7 p.m. CET) there is a slalom in Palisades near Lake Tahoe in which Linus Straßer wants to race for victory and his chances of winning the discipline classification.