Maiden win for Victor Muffat-Jeandet

The alpine combined from Wengen 2018 delivered three maiden winners: Victor Muffat-Jeandet took his first World Cup win, Pavel Trikhichev claimed his first podium and Peter Fill earned his first alpine combined globe.

The day started early morning with a downhill run on the legendary Lauberhorn track in Wengen, ending with Austrian Vincent Kriechmayr leading the pack, +0.59 ahead of his teammate Hannes Reichelt. However, in the second run on one of the most challenging slalom hills of the tour, the speed specialists had a hard time to keep up and lost a lot of time on the fastest time set by Victor Muffat-Jeandet.

The Frenchman boosted his confidence last week-end in Adelboden, where he laid down the fastest time of the second slalom run. Thanks to an acceptable downhill run (27th, +2.55), the snow conditions were perfect for his slalom run and he was able to clock a time that wouldn’t be beaten by anyone after him. After five World Cup podium in giant slalom (3) and alpine combined (2) so far, Victor Muffat-Jeandet now claimed his first World Cup win.

Pavel Trinkhichev is a name that probably didn’t ring a bell to most ski fans until today. The 25 years old Russian athlete won the Far East Cup Overall ranking last season and participated in 61 World Cup races so far. His best results came in the tech disciplines with a 16th place in the Adelboden giant slalom last week. Just within the Top 30 in the downhill run (29th, +2.59) he could also benefit from excellent conditions on the slalom run and ski onto the podium for the first time in his career.

Among the speed athletes, Peter Fill is the one that could handle the slalom the best. He was able to zig zag between the gates and hold on to his lead from the downhill run (4th) to clinch the third spot on the podium. The 60 points he scored today, added to the 80 he was able to earn with his second place in Bormio, offer a third globe to the South Tyrolean. After two consecutive downhill globes in the last two seasons, Peter Fill will be awarded the alpine combined globe 2018 at the World Cup Finals in Are.