Swiss veteran Didier Cuche ended a long wait to add the Chamonix World Cup downhill to his victory list with a technically brilliant winning performance in France yesterday.
The 36-year-old had claimed his first downhill win of the season last week in the Austrian resort of Kitzbuehel and he produced another near flawless performance to claim his first win on the legendary Verte des Houches run.
Italian Dominik Paris finished second, with Austrian Klaus Kroll in third.
The last time a Swiss won a men’s downhill race in Chamonix was in 1975 when Walter Vesti led a Swiss podium sweep in the shadow of Mont Blanc.
However, with Bode Miller of the US, second last week in Kitzbuehel, taking a short break, Cuche was widely tipped to carry his sparkling form over to the legendary French race known as the “Kandahar.”
Paris set the early pace, the Italian flying first out of the gate to set a time of 1 minute, 59.58 seconds, which many more experienced racers failed to better.
Croatia’s overall World Cup leader Ivica Kostelic finished more than 1.5 seconds off the pace, Canadian Erik Guay was 1.33 seconds behind, while Norwegian Aksel Lund Svindal flattered to deceive with a time that was 0.89 seconds behind Paris.
Of the Austrian contingent, only Kroll got close to dislodging 22-year-old Paris from top spot, although he finished second 0.21 seconds to get a sniff at a podium place.
A delay of about 20 minutes preceded Cuche’s run after Canadian Manuel Osborne-Paradis had to be airlifted to hospital following a heavy crash three-quarters of the way into his run.
The 26-yeard-old was racing toward a potential podium place finish, only 0.04 seconds off the pace of Paris when disaster struck.
One of the Canadian’s skis got caught in the snow and in trying to redress himself, Osborne-Paradis went flying into the air, landing on his back and then coming to a halt in the safety netting further down the slope. He was placed on a stretcher and airlifted to a local hospital.
Cuche was always on course for victory from the moment he exited the gate.
He shaved over half a second off Paris’ time by the second time check and gave the thousands of ski fans plenty of reason to cheer with a gliding master class, which, in turn, saw him extend his lead in the World Cup downhill standings.
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