Italian Alpine skier Sofia Goggia took a big step towards winning the small crystal globe in the women’s alpine skiing world cup downhill discipline after finishing first in Crans-Montana. She will almost certainly win the title in one of the two remaining races until the end of the season.
Sofia Goggia has dominated since the start of the season in the downhill, but suffered a major disappointment at the world championships where she was disqualified. In Courchevel, Jasmine Flury surprisingly became the champion, finishing only 17th today.
The Crans-Montana downhill began nearly 26 hours after the previously scheduled start after the course was covered in fog on Saturday and was replaced by heavy snowfall on Sunday. In the end, the skiers started, but with heightened attention because of the sometimes icy and sometimes soft track.
Ragnhild Mowinckel (Norway) set the pace with a time of 1:27.24 min in the fifth seed, but soon after Sofia Goggia improved her performance considerably. The Italian covered the course in 1:26.81 min, 0.43 secfaster than the Norwegian.
Sofia Goggia’s time held the lead until the end, giving her the event win for the fifth time of the season and the 17th of her career. The Italian was followed by 2020 World Cup winner Federica Brignone, who was 0.15 seconds behind. The 27-year-old Frenchwoman Laura Gauche recorded the first podium in her career, after her best ranking for the World Cup so far was fifth place. She was 0.41 sec behind in third place.
Ragnhild Mowinckel remained with the fourth time, and Sofia Goggia’s only real competitor in the discipline, Ilka Stuhec, finished only ninth. So the gap between the two has grown to 179 points and Sofia Goggia needs a top 10 finish in Norway or Andorra to win the downhill trophy.
In the general ranking, the leader and almost certain champion for the fifth time is the American Mikaela Shiffrin, who is on vacation after the world championship. Petra Vlhova and Lara Gut-Behrami, who finished 22nd and 13th respectively in Crans-Montana, are competing for the second place.
