Federica Brignone increasingly queen, Sofia Goggia on the podium
Federica Brignone in triumph
Great, great, great Federica Brignone; solid, solid Sofia Goggia: the champion from Valle d’Aosta triumphs in the super-G that completed the stage in Kvitfjell, Norway, ahead of Lara Gut Behrami and a’very good Goggia, third just 9 hundredths of a second to celebrate her 35th career victory.
That’s 80 podiums for Federica Brignone, 60 for Sofia Goggia: round numbers for the two Italian stars. Ahead of them all there’è again the 34-year-old Carabiniere from La Salle, protagonist of a crazy season that has so far seen her win on nine occasions, eight in the maximum circuit più the giant slalom world title won in Saalbach, a few days after the silver in SuperG.
After occupying the placings close to the podium in the two downhill runs on Friday and Saturday, the azzurre raised their voices further in an intriguing SuperG, to be interpreted and with several passages to be managed with tactical sagacity and experience.
It was a challenge that Brignone faced with her usual determination and effectiveness: she è was probably not as perfect as on other occasions, especially in the final, but overall Federica è was once again the best of the lot and the stopwatch projected her to the top of the ranking with a time of 1’30″11.
A reference approached by Lara Gut Behrami, second just six hundredths behind thanks to a powerful recovery in the final section of the OlympiaBakken, and by a Sofia Goggia who with 0″09 gap from her teammate completes the top3, climbing on the podium for the 17th time in World Cup super-G. For the Bergamasque, too, the Norwegian run was not è free of imperfections, a condition però unavoidable when faced with a tough draw like the Kvitfjell superG.
Behind Goggia, Alice Robinson rattled the Azzurri by recovering so much in the second half of the slope, finishing just 22 hundredths behind Brignone, with host Kajsa Vickhoff Lie and Czech Ester Ledecka fifth and sixth, at 0″27 and 0″32 respectively.
Elena Curtoni’s performance was also very positive as she slotted in ninth at 0″64 from the top, with Laura Pirovano 17th at 1″26 and Asja Zenere 20th at 1″36 to pick up more points in SuperG. Delay of 2″11 then for Roberta Melesi, of 2″37 for Nicol Delago, of 2″61 for her sister Nadia Delago and of 2″83 for Vicky Bernardi, while Marta Bassino did not finish the race, certainly not favored by bib number 1 that led her to face the Norwegian challenge without references.
Brignone’s eighth World Cup victory of the season allows her to stretch even further at the top of the overall standings: 1194 are her points, with the gap over Gut Behrami widening to 251 lengths; Sofia Goggia, on the other hand, jumps to third with 771. The Ticino native retains the red bib as specialty leader at 465 and a lead of 55 points over Brignone (410) and 159 over Goggia (306).
