Alpine SB World Cup hits future Olympic venue in Secret Garden this weekend
Feb 22, 2019·Alpine Snowboard
Secret Garden (CHN) - A weekend that has been marked on the calendars of the ladies and men of the FIS Snowboard alpine World Cup since the day it was announced is finally upon, as the best carvers in the world will get their first taste of action at the future Beijing 2022 Olympic Winter Games venue in Secret Garden (CHN) with parallel giant slalom on Saturday and parallel slalom competition on Sunday. Both days of riding will see the qualification/elimination phases start at 10:00 local time, followed by finals at 14:00.
According to the riders on site here in Secret Garden the snow conditions at the resort are extraordinary - fast, hard, and supportive from the initiation to exit of each turn - and the excitement to get to racing and see what the venue really has to offer is palpable.
This weekend’s competitions in Secret Garden come hot on the heels of what was a historic visit to another Olympic locale last weekend, as the PyeongChang 2018 Olympic Snowboard venue Bokwang Phoenix Park became the first Games site to welcome FIS Snowboard alpine World Cup competition back to its slopes after hosting the Games.
Both days of PGS competition in the return to PyeongChang were top-level affairs, with hard-fought heats and thrilling results in both the ladies’ and men’s competitions.
Day one of racing on the ladies’ side saw Ester Ledecka returning to snowboard competition showing no rust after missing a month and half of riding as she competed on the FIS Alpine Ski World Cup, earning a victory in her first competition of 2019 an then following that up the next day with a third-place finish.
The second day’s win went to Ramona Hofmeister of Germany, and both her and Ledecka should be looked to for strong results again this weekend on a Secret Garden course that will offer similarly ideal conditions to last weekend’s PyeongChang competition.
Austria’s Sabine Shoeffmann earned a pair of runner-up results in PyeongChang last weekend and now holds top spot on the parallel slalom and parallel overall World Cup rankings, while Ledecka sits atop the PGS standings.
Others to keep an eye on in Secret Garden include Selina Joerg (GER) and Julie Zogg (SUI), the respective PGS and PSL world champions from Utah 2019, PGS World Cup second overall Nadya Ochner (ITA) and fifth overall Natalia Soboleva (RUS), and PSL second overall Claudia Riegler (AUT) and fourth overall Aleksandra Krol (POL).
On the men’s side of things, results last weekend in PyeongChang once again served to illustrate just how tight and unpredictable things are in World Cup parallel competition this season, with five different athletes hitting the podium out of a possible six spots.
Top amongst them was Austria’s Andreas Prommegger, as the 38-year-old veteran of 242 career World Cup starts earned a third-place result in the first Korean event and followed that up with a win in the second race.
With the back-to-back podiums, Prommegger jumped to the top of the 2018/19 World Cup PGS and parallel overall standings, leapfrogging Roland Fischnaller (ITA) on the former and Benjamin Karl (AUT) on the latter.
Though both Fischnaller and Karl have had strong seasons in general, both faltered somewhat in PyeongChang, with Fischnaller’s best result an eighth-place in the second competition of the weekend and Karl’s a 12th. Expect both to be back on top of their games this weekend as they look to make statements in Secret Garden.
With so many athletes stepping up to put down good results at different points throughout this season and no past competition precedent it truly is up in the air who (after the favourites) might step up for some good results this weekend. Last weekend in PyeongChang was a good example of this, with the likes of Zan Kosir (SLO), Lukas Mathies (AUT), Sylvain Dufour (FRA), and Sangho Lee all claiming their first podiums in a year or longer.
However, in PGS look to Tim Mastnak (SLO), Edwin Coratti (ITA), and the above-mentioned Mathies to be in the thick of things on Saturday, while in PSL competition Dario Caviezel (SUI), Andrey Sobolev (RUS), and Stefan Baumeister (GER) currently sit 1-2-3 respectively and are solid bets for good performances.
WATCH LIVE
Saturday PGS - Eurosport Player, Eurosport 1 Asia/Pacific, NBC Sports Gold, ORF Sport +, BTV, Polsat Sport Extra, RTV Slo 2
Sunday PSL - Eurosport Player, Eurosport 1 Asia/Pacific, NBC Sports Gold, ORF Sport +, Polsat Sport Extra, RTV Slo 2
QUICK LINKS
Secret Garden data page (start lists, live timing, results)
Photos (following competition)
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