The Speed Queen Returns in Cortina
The speed queen of the FIS Ski World Cup tour, Lindsey Vonn (Vail, Colo.), returns to action in Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy, a bionic woman with braces on each knee, for a showdown with the fastest women in the world on the Olympia delle Tofane piste - a classic, and a favorite on the women’s tour.
Vonn will kick off what she has said will be her last season of competition, a sort of victory lap retirement tour that will end at her favorite venue - Lake Louise - next November. This weekend, she looks to further close the five-win gap that stands between her and the legendary Swede Ingemar Stenmark’s record of 86 World Cup victories. Vonn currently has 82 victories to her name and has won 12 times - six downhill victories and six super-G victories - in Cortina. She’ll have three opportunities this weekend to add to that total.
After returning to snow for training in early January in Reinswald, Italy, Vonn was feeling good and ready to race last week in St. Anton, Austria, but heavy snow forced a cancelation to the downhill and super-G events. The canceled downhill is rescheduled for Friday at Cortina d’Ampezzo, while the super-G has yet to be rescheduled. “I was really excited to race this weekend in St. Anton,” Vonn posted on Instagram last week, “but even more excited that it was rescheduled for Cortina next weekend...at one of my favorite venues.” In the first and only downhill training run for Vonn, she was a solid 10th place, while she took a conservative approach and skipped the second training run to rest her body.
For Vonn, Cortina has been a magical venue. Her first podium - a third place in downhill - was on January 18, 2004...15 years to the date of Friday's downhill. Her first victory in Cortina came in 2008 in downhill, and it was her 11th career victory. Not only is it a special place because she’s amassed 12 World Cup victories at the venue, but it’s also special because she broke the women’s all-time World Cup win record held by Austrian Annemarie Moser-Proell’s record in 2015, as well as the record for most downhill victories with her 37th downhill win in Cortina in 2016. Vonn now has 43 downhill victories to her name. Vonn’s 12 victories at the venue are at least two more than any other skier at a single venue (10 by Renate Götschl). The only skier to have won more World Cup races at a single ski resort is Vonn herself: 18 in Lake Louise. Speed Queen, indeed!
Mikaela Shiffrin (Avon, Colo.), fresh off her latest World Cup giant slalom victory in Kronplatz, Italy, Tuesday, has indicated she will not participate in the Cortina downhill events but will be in the start house for Sunday’s super-G. Shiffrin will be donning the red leader bib in the start gate, despite the fact that she didn’t start in the Val Gardena, Italy, super-G. Alice Merryweather (Hingham, Mass.) and Laurenne Ross (Bend, Ore.) will also start in Cortina, and have been feeling strong in training prior to the weekend.
On the men’s side, the weekend series in Wengen, Switzerland, starts off with an alpine combined on Friday, but all eyes will be on the “twin towers” - the big boys - Bryce Bennett (Squaw Valley, California) and Steven Nyman (Sundance, Utah) in Saturday’s premiere event, the downhill. Bennett finished fourth in the last two downhill races in the World Cup - in Val Gardena and Bormio, Italy. The last American skier to finish on the podium of a downhill race in the World Cup was Travis Ganong (Squaw Valley, Calif.), who won in Garmisch-Partenkirchen on January 27, 2017.
The Americans haven’t had a solid finish in Wengen on the classic 2.7 miles (4.4 km) Lauberhorn downhill - the longest downhill on tour - in quite some time. The downhill results in run times of two and a half minutes - 30-45 seconds longer than standard downhill races. With a schedule that has a holiday break and many of the Americans returning home for the new year, the Lauberhorn has been a bit of a conundrum for the men’s downhill team. Top speeds approach 100 mph (160 km/h) on its Haneggschuss, the highest speed clocked on tour. But, with Bennett’s fourth-fastest time in the first of two training runs on Wednesday, and Nyman’s fourth-fastest time in the second training run on Thursday, things could get interesting. Keep an eye on Ryan Cochran-Siegle (Starksboro, Vt.) and Olympic champion Ted Ligety (Park City, Utah) in Friday’s alpine combined.
Catch all of the action on the Olympic Channel, NBC Sports Network, and NBC Sports Gold.
AUDIO
Vonn Opening Press Conference - Cortina
Vonn, Post-Downhill Training Run 1 - Cortina
RESULTS
Women’s downhill training 1
Women’s downhill training 2
Men’s downhill training 1
Men’s downhill training 2
START LISTS
Women’s downhill 1
Men’s alpine combined
HOW TO WATCH
All times EST.
*Same-day delayed broadcast
**Next-day broadcast
Friday, Jan. 18
4:30 a.m. - Men’s alpine combined run 1 - Wengen, SUI - OlympicChannel.com & NBC Sports Gold
6:00 a.m. - Women’s downhill - Cortina d’Ampezzo, ITA - NBC Sports Gold
8:00 a.m. - Men’s alpine combined run 2 - Wengen, SUI - Olympic Channel-TV, OlympicChannel.com & NBC Sports Gold
7:00 p.m. - Women’s downhill - Cortina d’Ampezzo, ITA - NBCSN*
Saturday, Jan. 19
4:30 a.m. - Women’s downhill - Cortina d’Ampezzo, ITA - Olympic Channel-TV, OlympicChannel.com & NBC Sports Gold
6:30 a.m. - Men’s downhill - Wengen, SUI - Olympic Channel-TV, OlympicChannel.com & NBC Sports Gold
Sunday, Jan. 20
4:15 a.m. - Men’s slalom run 1 - Wengen, SUI - OlympicChannel.com & NBC Sports Gold
5:00 a.m. - Women’s super-G - Cortina d’Ampezzo, ITA - Olympic Channel-TV, OlympicChannel.com & NBC Sports Gold
7:00 a.m. - Men’s slalom run 2 - Wengen, SUI - Olympic Channel-TV, OlympicChannel.com & NBC Sports Gold
7:00 p.m. - Men’s downhill - Wengen, SUI - NBCSN**
8:00 p.m. - Women’s downhill - Cortina d’Ampezzo, ITA - NBCSN**
9:00 p.m. - Women’s super-G - Cortina d’Ampezzo, ITA - NBCSN*
All streams are available via desktop (NBCSports.com/Live, NBCSports.com/GoldandOlympicChannel.com) as well as mobile, tablet and connected television platforms. The NBC Sports app, NBC Sports Gold app and Olympic Channel app are available on the iTunes App Store, Google Play, Windows Store, Roku Channel Store, Apple TV and Amazon Fire. Exclusive commercial-free coverage will be available for subscribers of the NBC Sports Gold Pass.
