Liensberger notches first career World Cup win

Austrian Katharina Liensberger has been close all season and today at the Audi FIS World Cup slalom in Are (SWE) she finally earned her first career World Cup victory.

And she earned the victory in convincing fashion, with a 0.72 second lead over American Mikaela Shiffrin. Third place went to Switzerland’s Wendy Holdener, who was a hefty 1.65 seconds off the winning pace.

Liensberger won on the strength of a solid second run, which was nearly a second faster than Shiffrin’s second run efforts. The only racer who was faster than Liensberger in the second round was Petra Vlhova, but due to a massive mistake in the first run, Vlhova was only in 27th place heading into the second run and ultimately had to settle for eighth place.

The first run mistake cost Vlhova valuable points in the chase for the Overall Title, she sits 96 points ahead of Lara Gut-Behrami, but could have made the gap much larger with a stronger showing today.

Liensberger’s victory today, made another globe story even more dramatic as the Austrian bumped Shiffrin down to second place in the slalom globe standings. Vlhova still leads the race for the small globe, but now has only a 22-point lead over Liensberger.

The women’s tour now moves onto the Season Finals in Lenzerheide (SUI), where the downhill, slalom and Overall Globes are still up for grabs. Marta Bassino already wrapped up the giant slalom globe, while Gut-Behrami has already clinched the super-G globe.