Swiss Didier Cuche blitzed to victory in the season-opening men’s World Cup downhill on Saturday, laying down his marker as an Olympic medal threat.
The 35-year-old Cuche, who clocked a time of one minute 50.31 seconds in lightly falling snow to notch up his 11th career victory, become the oldest ever winner of a World Cup downhill.
Italy’s Werner Heel, who closed last season with a super-G victory at the World Cup finals, was back on the podium, taking second in 1:50.75 just ahead of Swiss Carlo Janka, runner-up in Lake Louise a year ago.
PHOTO: REUTERS
Led by Cuche, it was a superb day in the Canadian Rockies for the Swiss who had five skiers in the top 11. Ambrosi Hoffmann came home fifth, Tobias Gruenenfelder was ninth and Patrick Kueng 11th.
A multi-talented skier who never quite realized his potential, Cuche began his World Cup career in 1993 in Bormio, but needed five years to claim his maiden victory in 1998 at the world’s most famous downhill in Kitzbuehel.
Sixteen years on the World Cup circuit have produced just 11 victories, but Cuche has also been the circuit’s ultimate runner-up, posting 23 second places.
Over the last two seasons Cuche has enjoyed more regular wins, triumphing on the Hahnenkamm last year, a decade after his first success at Kitzbuehel, and capturing his first world championship gold medal with a super-G victory in Val d’Isere. Now with a fourth Olympics looming on the horizon, Cuche will have one more opportunity to plug another hole in his resume with a gold medal in Vancouver.
Austrian Michael Walchhofer, who had been quickest in final training, opened the defense of his World Cup downhill crown by placing fourth.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
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Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier