Zagreb, Croatia – Austrian Marcel Hirscher captured the victory in Thursday’s night slalom in Zagreb to move into the Audi FIS Alpine World Cup overall lead.
Croatian Ivica Kostelic retained the World Cup slalom lead with his third place finish behind Felix Neureuther of Germany.
Warm weather resulted in rapidly deteriorating course conditions, wreaking havoc on late starters in both the first and second runs. Reigning World Cup giant slalom champion Ted Ligety, of Park City, Utah, who was sixth after the first run, slipped in his second run to finish 14th to occupy the third rank overall.
“Ted actually skied a solid second run. If you look at the times from the first run, those guys sitting six through 16 were really close in times,” said Mike Day, the U.S. Ski Team men’s technical Head Coach.
Among other U.S. ski racers, Nolan Kasper was 25th, while Will Brandenburg and Jimmy Cochran went out in the second run. Colby Granstrom, Will Gregorak and Michael Ankeny did not qualify for the top 30 final, while Bode Miller did not start in favor of training for the weekend World Cup events in Adelboden, Switzerland.
“The course broke down almost incredibly fast and there was an opportunity there for a few of our guys in the second run,” explained Day. “We just didn’t take advantage of it.”
Canada’s Mike Janyk returned from injury to battle his way to a tie for 14th. The 29-year-old from Whistler, British Columbia, took almost three weeks off to rest an ankle sprain but two courageous runs in rough conditions earned him his best World Cup result of the 2011-12 season.
“I’m super happy. There are a lot of good things to take away from this,” said Janyk, who rolled his ankle during dry land training in Italy in mid-December. “My goal was top 15 today. I had to be realistic because I had over two weeks off skiing and I couldn’t expect to come back and be in the same form.”
Other Canadians finished well back in the pack. Paul Stutz missed out on qualifying for the second run. Trevor White was 46th, while Patrick Biggs, who was also returning from injury, finished 52nd. Both Erik Read and Julien Cousineau fell in the first run.
“The other guys, I wasn’t satisfied with the intensity. You need that to be really competitive,” said Paul Kristofic, head coach of Canada’s men’s alpine team. “They need to tighten their game and show good speed – especially with the way the conditions broke down with soft snow and a lot of ruts.”
OFFICIAL RESULTS
Audi FIS Alpine World Cup
Zagreb, Croatia – Jan. 5, 2012
Men’s Slalom
| Rank | Bib | Name | Year | Nation | Run 1 | Run 2 | Total Time | FIS Points |
| 1 | 1 | HIRSCHER Marcel | 1989 | AUT | 55.96 | 55.88 | 1:51.84 | 0.00 |
| 2 | 4 | NEUREUTHER Felix | 1984 | GER | 56.54 | 55.59 | 1:52.13 | 1.58 |
| 3 | 3 | KOSTELIC Ivica | 1979 | CRO | 56.08 | 56.24 | 1:52.32 | 2.62 |
| 4 | 6 | DEVILLE Cristian | 1981 | ITA | 56.74 | 55.93 | 1:52.67 | 4.53 |
| 5 | 2 | MYHRER Andre | 1983 | SWE | 56.06 | 57.66 | 1:53.72 | 10.25 |
| 6 | 12 | MISSILLIER Steve | 1984 | FRA | 58.84 | 54.95 | 1:53.79 | 10.64 |
| 7 | 11 | HARGIN Mattias | 1985 | SWE | 58.22 | 55.87 | 1:54.09 | 12.27 |
| 8 | 8 | MOELGG Manfred | 1982 | ITA | 57.94 | 56.16 | 1:54.10 | 12.33 |
| 9 | 13 | BYGGMARK Jens | 1985 | SWE | 58.16 | 55.95 | 1:54.11 | 12.38 |
| 10 | 25 | GROSS Stefano | 1986 | ITA | 58.80 | 55.41 | 1:54.21 | 12.93 |