French skier Allègre upsets favourites in men's World Cup super-G for 1st career win
Jeff Read top Canadian in 20th; Odermatt's run of 12 straight event podiums halted
French skier Nils Allègre sped to his first career World Cup victory Saturday as two late starters upset the higher-ranked favourites at a tight super-G on the classic Kandahar course in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany.
Wearing bib 18, Allègre beat Guglielmo Bosca by 0.18 seconds, posting a time of one minute 11.92 seconds after the Italian finished and spent two minutes hoping for what would have been his maiden win.
Allègre and Bosca, both 30-year-old veterans on the Alpine skiing circuit, denied the Swiss team a 1-2 finish. Loic Meillard led season dominator Marco Odermatt by 3-100ths of a second after the top-10 ranked super-G racers had completed their runs.
"It was great, it was just like something go out of me," Allègre said in tears in a course-side interview when asked about the moment he finished. "I'm 30 years old, it's my 102nd start today, so … I never stopped believing in me and today everything [went] in the right direction."
The Frenchman had not finished better than fourth before, most recently at a downhill in Val Gardena, Italy last December, when we was bumped off the podium when American racer Bryce Bennett took the victory as a late starter.
WATCH | Allègre earns 1st World Cup win, beating Bosca by 0.18 seconds in Germany:
"It's a good day, I had a perfect feeling on my ski from the top to the bottom, I feel really confident on it, I can push a lot," Allègre said.
Jeff Read of Canmore, Alta., was top Canadian in 20th, followed by Cameron Alexander (North Vancouver, B.C., 23rd) and Toronto's Jack Crawford (25th).
Overall World Cup leader Odermatt's fourth position (1:12.20) ended his series of 12 straight super-G podiums, a feat previously only achieved by Austrian great Hermann Maier two decades ago. No male skier has ever had a top-three result in 13 consecutive super-Gs.
"A weird race today with small time differences," Odermatt said. "That's because it was a very, very easy and a short super-G, a simple course. In these conditions you cannot make the difference anywhere."
Allègre continued the strong run by the French team, led by Cyprien Sarrazin, in men's speed events this season.
Another super-G is scheduled for Sunday. Live coverage begins at 5:30 a.m. ET on CBCSports.ca, the CBC Sports app and CBC Gem.
'We are one team'
In his breakthrough speed season, former giant slalom specialist Sarrazin won one downhill in Bormio in December and two in Kitzbuehel, Austria last week. In Wengen, Switzerland, he was runner-up twice and won the super-G. On Saturday, he finished 0.64 behind Allegre and outside the top 10.
"We get a good result for everybody in the team. This way we try to continue and push more and more and more," Allègre said. "We are one team and it really helps us in the good days but in the bad days, too."
After days of rain and mild temperatures, the course, surrounded by green fields, was weakened and organizers used salt to harden its surface.
Allègre said he benefitted from the conditions with "the salty snow."
"The first part was not really good, the snow was not really compact on the top," the Frenchman said. "I said to myself in the finish area before seeing my time that maybe I was not that fast because I didn't feel really great. But it was the wrong thing."
The top 13 finished within 7-10ths of Allègre's winning time, and included Franjo von Allmen, who started 44th and placed ninth as the course held up well.
WATCH | Full coverage of Saturday's men's super-G:
With files from CBC Sports
