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Lindsey Vonn World Cup

February 5, 2012 by · Comments Off on Lindsey Vonn World Cup 

Lindsey Vonn World Cup, Julia Mancuso, of the United States, face to camera, celebrates with her teammate Lindsey Vonn after winning an alpine ski, women’s World Cup super-G, in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany, Sunday, Feb. 5, 2012.

It was the first time two different American women have won World Cup races on consecutive days since December 2006, when it was also Vonn and Mancuso.

Vonn captured her milestone 50th World Cup win in a downhill on the same slope a day earlier. But she was forced to wait for her start for about three minutes while officials fixed a gate and Vonn could not hold her line Sunday after hitting a bump midway down the icy piste. She was looking for a record 18th super-G career win.

Mancuso produced a clean run in freezing conditions, with bright sunlight and deep shadows alternating on the Kandahar course and making for poor visibility. She won on the same slope where she clinched the super-G silver medal at last year’s World Championship.

“I thought when I crossed the finish line, ‘If that wasn’t good enough, then I don’t know what is,’” Mancuso said. “I didn’t feel like I had the best run, but I kept my skies stable the whole way.

“The course was set really fast, besides a couple of turns, and I knew I had to push myself to the limit and make those technical sectors clean, then it was just a case of trying to go as fast as possible. You couldn’t see, I just had to try to stay on it.”

It was Mancuso’s first super-G win since 2007 in Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy. She now has six career World Cup wins, to go with two Olympic silver medals and a giant slalom gold at the 2006 games.

“You have to go fast and not care where you are. I like to see — it’s better when it’s sunny — but it gives me an advantage, because I know I can perform in difficult conditions,” Mancuso said.

Vonn was not the only one to ski off the course. Four of the first six starters also failed to finish and several others joined the group, including Tina Maze of Slovenia, Vonn’s closet challenger for the overall title. Vonn still has a massive lead of 482 points.

Vonn quickly left the finish area and could not be reached for comment.

Mancuso finished in 1 minute, 20.50 seconds. Anna Fenninger of Austria, super-combined world champion here last year, was second, 0.13 seconds behind, and Tina Weirather of Liechtenstein was third, 0.45 back.

Weirather was also third in Saturday’s downhill, while Maria Hoefl-Riesch of Germany, last season’s overall World Cup champion, finished fourth for the second straight day.

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