SAALBACH-HINTERGLEMM, Austria (AP) — Federica Brignone and Sofia Goggia.
Or Sofia Goggia and Federica Brignone.
The two Italian skiers have been enjoying so much success lately that often it’s just been a question of which one of them finishes ahead of the other.
Like when Brignone finished a mere 0.01 seconds ahead of Goggia to win the final World Cup downhill before the world championships.
Or when Goggia and Brignone swept the official test events for next year’s Olympics in Cortina d’Ampezzo by winning a downhill and a super-G, respectively, on back-to-back days last month.
The Alpine skiing world championships opened with Italy winning the parallel team event on Tuesday and now Brignone and Goggia are among the favorites in almost all of the upcoming women’s events: starting with the super-G on Thursday and moving on to the downhill on Saturday.
Goggia and Brignone might also join forces for the new team combined event next week, which entails one racer competing in downhill and another in slalom. The times from the two racers are then added together to determine the final results. Goggia would race downhill and Brignone would race slalom — even though slalom is Brignone's weakest event.
First, though, there are the individual speed events and Brignone, who has been on the podium in the last seven races she’s completed, has a simple approach.
“I will try just to do my skiing and my best and what I’ve been doing all winter and not to change anything,” she said.
In all, of the 15 races that Brignone has entered this season, she’s been on the podium eight times; winning five of them. She also leads the overall World Cup standings and the downhill standings.
Goggia, who started her preparations for this season late because of a crash a year ago, has five podium finishes in 11 races and two wins. Not bad for a skier who had a metal rod inserted into her right leg attached with seven screws to repair her tibia and malleolus bones last February.
Goggia missed last season’s World Cup finals while she was out recovering, so she's new to the course in Saalbach-Hinterglemm.
“I still have a lot to study and to learn from in the video analysis,” Goggia said after placing 11th in downhill training on Wednesday.
Having claimed gold and silver in downhill at the last two Olympics, one of the big things missing from Goggia’s trophy cabinet is a gold at the worlds. She took silver in super-G in 2019 and bronze in giant slalom in 2017.
“This is a unique downhill in that it’s not a steep hill — it’s fairly flat — but you’ve really got to handle all of the terrain well, adjust to the rhythm of the course and charge as hard as possible,” Goggia said. “It’s not a difficult course but it’s difficult to master correctly.”
At last year's World Cup finals in Saalbach, Brignone won the giant slalom, finished second in the super-G behind Ester Ledecka and was ninth in downhill.
But Brignone has taken a big step up in downhill this season, claiming her first two victories in the discipline. Having also won two giant slaloms and that super-G in Cortina this season, Brignone is on course for her second overall title.
“To me, the best skier has always been the one who can do it all in the same season,” Brignone said. “That’s what I aspired to as a kid, so to be able to say I’ve done that is pretty cool.”
At 34, Brignone is the oldest woman to win a World Cup race. She’ll ski for at least one more season, with Italy hosting next year’s Milan-Cortina Olympics. Having won a silver and two bronzes at the Olympics and a gold and two silvers at the worlds, Olympic gold is the only big thing missing from her medal haul.
For now, though, the focus is on worlds.
“Austria is the temple of skiing. It’s like soccer in Italy,” Brignone said. “I was injured during the last Austrian worlds (in Schladming in 2013), so these are my first worlds in Austria and I can’t wait to participate.”
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AP skiing: https://apnews.com/hub/alpine-skiing
Andrew Dampf, The Associated Press
