Kalle Palander back on the slalom podium

Finnish skier took both runs to the very edge

print this

Kalle Palander took his second podium position of the new FIS World Cup season on Monday, finishing third in the men’s slalom at Sestriere in Italy, the venue for the 2006 Olympics. Earlier Palander had opened the season with a 3rd place finish in the giant slalom in Sölden at the end of October.
      The race was won in overwhelming style by Bode Miller of the United States, who left a gap of 1.27 seconds between himself and runner-up Silvan Zurbriggen of Switzerland. Palander was a further 0.14 seconds back.
      The American has stamped his class all over the Alpine skiing world this autumn, and has already won at least one event in all four disciplines: slalom, giant slalom, super-G, and downhill. This is only the second time such a straight flush has been achieved in a single season. Marc Girardelli of Luxemburg managed the feat in 1989.
     
The Finn was third after his first run, despite coming close to tumbling over on the way down. On his second run he was travelling well in the early stages, but made a colossal mistake at one gate in the choppy conditions, and this time he came very close indeed to going out in spectacular style. A mixture of technical brilliance and brute strength got him through the next gate on one ski. Not surprisingly, Palander was all smiles when he got down to the finish area: the 60 World Cup points he collected could very easily have vanished in a cloud of powder and skis.
      He also acknowledged that whilst his own skiing was pretty much in shape, and that he was pleased to see he was prepared to attack the hill in earnest, there was never going to be any other winner than Bode Miller: "Only one man skied really well; the rest of us got down as best we could."
      The additional points push Palander up to 2nd place in the slalom rankings, and to seventh overall. Not surprisingly, Bode Miller holds a lead in the overall World Cup table that would make even Finnish ski-jumper Janne Ahonen green with envy. He has 730 points, 391 more than his nearest rival, Hermann Maier of Austria.


Links:
  FIS World Cup Standings: men

Helsingin Sanomat