(Garmisch-Partenkirchen) On her last run before the Beijing Olympics, Quebecer Marie-Michèle Gagnon finished ninth in the Alpine Skiing World Cup race presented on Saturday in Garmisch-Partenkirchen.
Posted at 9:48 a.m.
The 32-year-old athlete from Lac-Etchemin crossed the finish line in 1 minute 41.79 seconds, or 1.05 seconds behind the winner, Swiss Corinne Suter.
In the absence of Sofia Goggia, Suter, the world champion, offered a dominant performance that allowed her to edge her compatriot Jasmine Fleury by 51 hundredths of a second.
This is his first World Cup victory since December 18, 2020.
Austrian Cornelia Huetter finished third, 78 hundredths of a second behind Suter.
With her victory, Suter moved up to second overall in the discipline, although she remains 69 points behind Goggia.
The latter would have been the big favorite to successfully defend her Olympic title in the downhill, but she was injured in the super-G in Cortina d’Ampezzo last week.
The 29-year-old Italian suffered a sprained left knee, a torn cruciate ligament, a “minor fracture” of the fibula and damaged tendons.
Goggia has started his physical rehabilitation with the aim of returning in time for the downhill at the Beijing Games on February 15. She will most likely have to skip the giant slalom on February 7 and the super-G on February 11.
With the Olympics approaching, many of the top female skiers have opted out of the race, including Mikaela Shiffrin, Petra Vlhova and recent Zauchensee downhill winner Lara Gut-Behrami.
Goggia won the other four downhills presented this season.
Among the top-10 of the general classification of the World Cup, Federica Brignone and Elena Curtoni were the only ones to take part in the descent. They finished 18and and 16andrespectively.
A super-G will be presented at the same location on Sunday.
With contribution from The Associated Press