Otmar Striedinger in a fantastic shape at Beaver Creek

The second speed week on the schedule of the Audi FIS Ski World Cup men’s Tour started today with the first downhill training run on the infamous Birds Of Prey in Beaver Creek.

Following the snow storm of last week-end in Colorado, Beaver Creek has been blessed with over 50 centimeters of fresh snow, but the Talon Crew managed to clean the course and make it race ready for today. The conditions were a little softer than last year and it was a little windy in the upper part, but nothing that prevented a successful training run today.

Otmar Striedinger, from Austria, tackled the course the best and laid down a winning time of 1:42:67 with his bib 36. Already in the trainings in Lake Louise he proved that his ground speed is there this season, but he didn’t managed to bring it on to the race day. Maybe this week will be different for him, as his only World Cup podium in career came in the Beaver Creek super-g in 2013.

Vincent Kriechmayr (AUT), who was on the podium last week in Lake Louise and had his first World Cup win in Beaver Creek last year, and Aksel Lund Svindal, who already has a record of 13 podiums in Beaver Creek, including 7 wins, rounded out the fictive podium of the day.

Another training run is scheduled tomorrow, but the weather conditions are not promising with more snow coming in during the night. A decision will be taken in the morning. After that, the athletes will switch to race mode for a super-g on Friday, a downhill on Saturday and the first giant slalom of the season on Sunday.

Results are available here: Beaver Creek DH TRA 2