ALTENMARKT-ZAUCHENSEE, Austria — Lindsey Vonn made a couple of mistakes and Swiss teen Lara Gut capitalized to win Sunday’s World Cup super-G race for her second career victory.
The 19-year-old Swiss had a near-flawless run on the demanding Kaelberloch course to finish in 1 minute, 12.82 seconds and beat Vonn by 0.53.
“It’s an incredible feeling,” said Gut, whose first victory also came in a super-G, in December 2008 at St. Moritz, Switzerland.
Vonn was disappointed to see her leading time beaten, but she was not surprised by Gut’s performance.
“I knew she was going to have a good run and thought my time wasn’t good enough to hold up,” said Vonn, who won the only previous super- G this season, at Lake Louise, Alberta, in December.
The three-time defending overall champion lost speed as she almost fell in a right turn and had both hands in the snow to avoid crashing.
“I am happy with second,” she said. “I made a couple of mistakes today and almost fell on the bottom. I just caught some soft snow and almost went on my hip. Thankfully I finished the race.”
Gut’s teammate Dominique Gisin was 0.72 seconds behind in third.
Julia Mancuso placed 16th and Laurenne Ross was 23rd for the U.S.
Kostelic wins slalom
ADELBODEN, Switzerland — Ivica Kostelic of Croatia completed an excellent week by winning the World Cup slalom to move into first in the overall standings.
Kostelic overcame worsening conditions in the afternoon to defend his big lead from the morning run and finish in a combined two-leg time of 1 minute, 50.90 seconds.
Marcel Hirscher of Austria was runner-up, 0.26 seconds back after being the only racer within 1.3 seconds of Kostelic in the first run.
Kostelic has soared to the top of the overall and slalom standings after an impressive eight-day spell.
The 31-year-old slalom specialist won the parallel slalom in Munich last Sunday and placed second in his home slalom at Zagreb on Thursday.
The Associated Press
