Anna Fenninger of Austria upstaged the favorites to win a super-G race on Sunday, while overall World Cup winner Tina Maze was placed under police protection after organizers received a death threat against the Slovenian.
Maze finished fourth in the race and said she was not disturbed by the e-mailed threat, but she had two bodyguards close by after the race.
The death threat came in an e-mail received on Saturday afternoon, after Maze had won the downhill race and broken the points record for a season.
“That’s sad. If somebody is strong and showing good performances and perfect in the thing you are doing, there are people who want to disturb you,” Maze said. “I guess it’s part of the game, but it didn’t disturb me that much.”
“It shouldn’t be part of the game, but life is not perfect. It’s not nice for me, it’s not nice for my team. I haven’t seen the e-mail ... they want to ruin your day, ruin the record, but I enjoyed the day 100 percent,” Maze said.
Peter Fischer, chief of the organizing committee, said the e-mail came from an anonymous source and that it was immediately turned over to the police.
“We had to take it seriously, our job is to keep everyone safe here,” Fischer said. “Police took over the case and provided protection.”
Maze said she had never felt safer in her life: “I’ve had police in front [of] my door all the time since yesterday.”
Fenninger beat hometown favorite Maria Hoefl-Riesch by 0.20 seconds on the Kandahar course for her third career victory and second of the season.
The Austrian also saw off Julia Mancuso of the US in third and Maze in fourth.
Mancuso and Maze are still battling for the super-G title, which will now be decided at the World Cup finals in Lenzerheide, Switzerland, in two weeks.
Maze is already assured of the overall title and became the first skier to collect more than 2,000 points in a season by winning Saturday’s downhill on the same slope. She now has 2,074 points.
Maze leads Mancuso 420-365 in the super G standings with a maximum of 100 points up for grabs in the final race.
Like Mancuso, Maze also said she had problems with the jump in the middle section.
“It was pretty difficult to find the right line, I didn’t do my best, but fourth is fine,” Maze said.
MEN’S SUPER-G
AP, KVITFJELL, Norway
Aksel Lund Svindal clinched the World Cup super-G title on Sunday after winning his first race in his home country, Norway.
Svindal edged Austria’s Georg Streitberger by 0.52 seconds to win in 1 minute, 29.79 seconds. Werner Heel of Italy ended third, 0.57 seconds back.
The victory gives the Norwegian an unassailable 480 points, ahead of Italy’s Matteo Marsaglia on 249 and Matthias Mayer of Austria with 228.
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