Venier denies champion Goggia downhill win

Garmisch-Partenkirchen (Agencies): Olympic champion Sofia Goggia had to once again settle for second in Sunday’s women’s downhill World Cup race in Garmisch-Partenkirchen after Austria’s Stephanie Venier denied the Italian victory on her comeback from injury.

“I had the feeling I was quick, but I was surprised to be ahead of Sofia,” Venier said. Italy’s Goggia, who also took second in Saturday’s Super-G, was an early leader before Venier shaved 0.25sec off her time, clocking 1min 37.46sec, to claim the first World Cup victory of her career with Germany’s Kira Weidle third at 0.54 back.

“It wasn’t perfect, I braked too much and could have been faster,” said Goggia, who struggled to land a jump on the mid-section of the course — a tough test for her recovering ankle.

“It didn’t hurt much. My foot is okay.” However, Goggia said her personal success was overshadowed by injury to team-mates Federica Brignone and Federica Sosio, who were both taken to hospital. The race was called off after Sosio’s crash with race officials telling AFP the Italian had suffered a suspected broken leg. “I have mixed emotions after seeing one of team-mates so badly hurt, which is always sad,” said Goggia. “I hear that Federica Brignone is okay.”

Goggia, who won the Olympic downhill gold last year, has proved she is back to her best this weekend in her first races after three months out with a fractured ankle. She has timed her return in Garmisch perfectly, ten days out from the world alpine championships, which begin in Are, Sweden, on February 5.

Slovenia’s Ilka Stuhec, who will be defending her world downhill title, finished fifth fastest in Garmisch at 0.85sec. It was the fourth time in a row Goggia has come second in Garmisch after she twice finished runner-up behind US ski queen Lindsey Vonn in last year’s back-to-back downhill races.

Venier’s victory caps a golden weekend for Austria’s women after team-mate Nicole Schmidhofer, who won back-to-back downhill races in Lake Louise at the start of the season, took Saturday’s Super-G.

It is the first time Austrian women have won five downhill races in a World Cup eason since 1998/98.

Ramona Siebenhofer, who won back-to-back downhills in Cortina d’Ampezzo last weekend, was denied a hat-trick after misjudging a corner, having been ahead after the first three time checks, and could only finish 1.37sec behind Venier. The Kandahar course proved tricky to master.

Several big names fell foul of the mid-section of the course, including Olympic Super-G champion Ester Ledecka, who crashed in Saturday’s Super-G and badly misjudged a corner in the downhill, ending up 4.38sec back. Both Vonn, who has a knee injury, and overall World Cup leader Mikaela Shiffrin, sat out Garmisch to prepare for the world championships.