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Svindal puts fear to one side, grabs downhill victory

Aksel Lund Svindal showed no hint of apprehension while winning the World Cup downhill on Friday a year after a serious crash on the Birds of Prey course ended his season.

Svindal careened down the course like his old self and finished in 1 minute, 43.85 seconds. Marco Buechel of Liechtenstein was second, 0.06 seconds behind, and Canada’s Erik Guay was third.

“I knew I was going to be nervous, so I figured there’s no point in acting tough and pretending you’re not nervous,” Svindal said. “If you admit it, then you can work on it. That’s a better strategy than pretending like you’re Superman because none of us really are.”

The race was a psychological test for Svindal, who broke his nose and cheekbone in last year’s training run. He may have fractured a few ribs as well, but he’s not completely sure about that, and didn’t want to ask.

The 15cm laceration on his left buttock, though, had doctors so concerned they went into his stomach to make sure everything internally was still intact.

“Everything was good so they put the stuff back in there and closed it up,” he said, smiling.

He spent two weeks healing in a Vail hospital, a ski slope visible from his window. That only served as motivation. Three months after the accident, Svindal was back on skis, lightly cruising down the slopes.

Now, he’s a World Cup winner again.

“Today he was able to throw down and attack like he did in the past, like he did last year before his injury,” Guay said.

Buechel skied just the way he envisioned.

“I watched a lot of video after the first training [run]. I looked at Bode’s [Miller] video and I knew how to ski it in my head,” he said. “It’s burned in there how to ski it ... I was all psyched because I pulled it off.”

The 37-year-old Buechel was contemplating staying around skiing awhile longer, maybe even for the Olympics in Vancouver in 2010.

“This morning I would have said I’ll be done next spring, but after this podium, what the heck,” Buechel said. “It’s like the wine — the older [I] get, the faster I get. But suddenly you’ve got to watch out — you don’t turn into vinegar.”

Although the snow was in prime condition, the Americans were not.

Miller wiped out after clipping his left ski on a gate, Marco Sullivan wound up too wide on a turn, burning by a gate, and Andrew Weibrecht flew into the air before becoming ensnared in protective fencing. He suffered only a bloody nose.

Steven Nyman turned in the top US finish, taking seventh, and ending a string of five straight podium finishes by the Americans in the downhill at this event.



■WOMEN’S DOWNHILL

AFP, LAKE LOUISE, CANADA

American Lindsey Vonn got her World Cup downhill defense off to a rousing start on Friday as she was joined by two familiar foes on the podium at Lake Louise.

The reigning World Cup overall and downhill champion won for the fifth consecutive year on the Whitehorn Mountain course, charging down the slope in blizzard conditions to finish in a time of 1 minute, 26.10 seconds.

She finished ahead of Italy’s Nadia Fanchini and Maria Riesch of Germany.

It was a case of musical chairs for the trio as they also shared the podium in 2006. Riesch won that downhill, with Vonn finishing second and Fanchini third.

“It is pretty cool for all of us to be up her again,” Vonn said. “We all feel very comfortable skiing here.”

Fanchini, whose older sister Elena won here two years ago, was runner-up in a time of 1 minute, 26.71 seconds, while Riesch clocked 1 minute, 26.79 seconds for third.

Riesch’s German compatriot Gina Stechert finished fourth, while a pair of Austrians, Andrea Fischbacher and Maria Holaus, tied for fifth.

Friday’s race was the first downhill of the 2008-2009 season and the first of two downhills scheduled for Lake Louise.

Race officials had to move the start gate 400m down the hill because of poor weather conditions, that included steady snow and strong winds that buffeted the skiers throughout the race.

“The key is with this kind of weather is not to get intimidated or afraid,” Vonn said. “You have to go out there and keep fighting the whole way down.”
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