VAL D’ISÈRE, France — Vail’s Lindsey Vonn won her first downhill race of the season Saturday to close the gap on World Cup overall leader Maria Riesch, who finished 24th.
The three-time defending World Cup overall and reigning Olympic downhill champion had finished second behind her German rival in both downhills at Lake Louise two weeks ago. But Vonn turned the tables at Val d’Isère, one of her favorite stops.
Despite a wobble near the top section of the 1.7-mile Oreiller-Killy course, Vonn finished in a time of 1 minute, 51.42 seconds.
“I love Val d’Isère, I’ve always had a good feeling here. It’s great to have another victory,” said Vonn, who won a downhill-super-G world championship double and World Cup super combined race here last year.
She also won World Cup downhill races here in 2005 and 2006.
This time, she made a spectacular recovery after nearly crashing on the turn just below the second jump. Vonn feared that slip would cost her, but Riesch fared much worse than expected.
“I made a big mistake at the top, but I tried to make up time on the bottom and I think I skied pretty well on the turns,” Vonn said. “At the finish, I thought it was a good time but, for sure, Maria would beat me.”
Vonn’s win moves her to the top of the downhill standings ahead of Riesch, who leads Vonn by 52 points in the overall standings before Sunday’s super combined race.
Swiss pair Nadja Kamer and Lara Gut were second and third, respectively.
Vonn was 0.001 seconds behind Kamer at the second time split but picked up speed on the second part of the course to beat her by 0.68 seconds and the 19-year-old Gut by 0.80.
