Camille Rast confirms in Semmering that she has also caught up with the world's best in the giant slalom. The 26-year-old slalom world champion finished second behind Julia Scheib on the World Cup podium for the second time in her second strongest discipline.
In the first run, Rast pushed herself into 5th place on a battered slope with bib number 14 and made up three more places in the second run with the second-best time. In the end, she was just 14 hundredths short of her first giant slalom victory.
Victory went to the in-form Austrian Julia Scheib, who climbed to the top of the podium for the third time this season and took the lead in the discipline rankings from Alice Robinson. The New Zealander, who has been the most consistent giant slalom racer alongside Federica Brignone in recent years, was eliminated in the first run. In the absence of the long-term injured Brignone and Lara Gut-Behrami, third place went to Sweden's Sara Hector, who led the classification at the halfway point.
Scheib, who had only finished on the podium once in 45 giant slaloms before this season, ended a 13-year drought for the Austrians in the Semmering giant slalom with her home win. Anna Veith was the last Austrian athlete to triumph on the magic mountain in 2012.
Rast: "I am mega satisfied"
For her part, Rast was only the fourth Swiss woman to make it onto the podium in this race after Sonja Nef, Corinne Rey-Bellet and Gut-Behrami. With places 4 (2x) and 5 in the last giant slaloms, she had already indicated that she had also caught up with the world's best in her second strongest discipline.
This mistake certainly cost me a few hundredths. But if you take risks, then that's the way it is. In Kranjska Gora I'll start from the top 7, which will also help me in the first run.
Just over a year after her 3rd place in Killington, her first "giant" podium of her career, there was little missing this time for her first victory. The persistent back pain is apparently no longer affecting the Valais skier just over a month before the Olympic Games in Cortina d'Ampezzo.
"I'm super happy. It was a struggle. I gave it my all," said Rast in an interview with SRF after the race. "At the start, my coach said you need the green light and a half-second lead if you want to be on the podium. That worked out well."
Rast does not have time to rest after the Christmas holidays. The slalom follows on Sunday in Semmering, and after the turn of the year, the action continues in Kranjska Gora with a giant slalom and a slalom (January 3-4).
In Slovenia, the Swiss racer will start from the top 7 in the giant slalom. "That will help me in the first run," says the 26-year-old confidently, who started with number 14 in the first run in Semmering.
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