Sarrazin Trumps Odermatt For Prestigious Kitzbuehel Downhill Win

Kitzbühel, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 19th Jan, 2024) France's Cyprien Sarrazin confirmed his impressive form Friday by streaking to victory in the men's World Cup downhill in Kitzbuehel, widely regarded as the most testing and prestigious race on the circuit.

Sarrazin, who in Wengen last week won the super-G and finished second in both downhills, clocked a winning time of 1min 55.75sec down the 3.3km-long Streif course in the upmarket Austrian resort to become the first French winner in the discipline here in 27 years.

Italy's Florian Schieder was second at 0.05sec to mirror his first-ever podium finish from last year.

Switzerland's runaway overall standings leader Marco Odermatt edged American Ryan Cochran-Siegle for third (+0.34).

"The Streif is like a good action movie - exciting until the end," had been the race take of Arnold Schwarzenegger, the Austrian bodybuilder/actor-cum-former California governor who is an ever-present during racing.

Irish-German actor Michael Fassbender and American politician John Kerry were also among the celebrities in the stands for the 84th running of the downhill, which made its debut in 1931.

The course on the Hahnenkamm mountain, named after a rooster's comb, has a vertiginous start that propels racers to 100km/h in the first five seconds of action.

They quickly accelerate to motorway-coasting speeds of 140km/h further down the piste, snakes and rolls sending competitors barrelling through a wide variety of terrain, in parts propelling them in the air, only for them to quickly re-align for icy traverses that severely test technical ability and mastery of well-honed equipment

"I am so full of respect for these athletes," said Hollywood giant Fassbender.

The victory was a fourth in the World Cup for Sarrazin, who also won the Bormio downhill in late December sparking a rich vein of form.

It saw him become the first French speed skier to win since compatriot Luc Alphand, who won the last of his three Kitzbuehel downhills in 1997.

"He's writing me out of history!" Alphand said. "We knew he had the inner strength. He is the story, all the work he has put in."

Odermatt's third place sees the 26-year-old Swiss consolidate his place atop the overall standings, on 1,076 points, a massive 516 ahead of Sarrazin.

Austrian Marco Schwarz and Norway's Aleksander Aamodt Kilde sit in third and fourth spots, but both racers have been ruled out for the rest of the season with injuries, the latter last week in Wengen after a horror crash that saw him dislocate his shoulder and sustain cuts to his leg and face.