
From a Swiss perspective, the slalom in Kitzbühel is one of missed opportunities. Tanguy Nef (7th) and Daniel Yule (11th) were less than three and four tenths off the top three respectively.
Although he was ultimately further away from a podium place, Daniel Yule was more annoyed than his team-mate. Because he lost too much speed on the final section of the second run, which is rather flat and leads over a crest, the two-time Kitzbühel winner (2020 and 2023) missed out on what could have been his fifth podium finish on the Ganslernhang.
Too little confidence
The skier from Valais, who was third at the last intermediate time measurement, was the slowest of all 27 classified skiers in the last twelve seconds. He lost no less than half a second on Noël. His deficit at the finish to the now four-time season winner from France: 0.58 seconds. "The second run was very good. I went full throttle for a long time. But then I didn't dare enough on the last transition. Frustrating, a lot more would have been possible," said Yule.
Something similar had already happened to him in Kitzbühel in 2024. He also lost up to five tenths on the fastest skiers in the final section and missed out on victory as a result. But he still managed to finish on the podium in third place. In the end, only two tenths separated him from the German winner Linus Strasser.
Nef makes his debut in Kitzbühel
Tanguy Nef, for his part, spoke of a "good performance", although he lost two positions in the second run. The man from Geneva was satisfied because he managed a controlled run to the finish. For him, this is absolutely not a matter of course in Kitzbühel, "because I've never won points here before". In five previous World Cup starts on the Ganslernhang, he had been eliminated five times.
This winter, the 28-year-old has achieved remarkable consistency. He scored seven times in eight slaloms and finished in the top eight four times. A week ago in Wengen, he finished fourth, his best ever position. Now in Kitzbühel, he was just 25 hundredths short of his first career podium finish and only 44 hundredths short of victory.
Marc Rochat was the third best Swiss (20th). With 23rd place, Ramon Zenhäusern achieved his second-best result of the season after the slalom opener in Levi in mid-November, where he finished 20th.