Wengen, Switzerland – Friday the 13^th proved to be more about luck than position at the men’s World Cup Combined in Wengen, as Switzerland’s Niels Hintermann came out of the 51^st start position to win his career-first World Cup event in only his 12^th start on the World Cup circuit. And the surprises didn’t stop with Hintermann. France’s Maxence Muzaton scored a career-first World Cup podium in second, as did Austria’s Frederic Berthold, who finished third. In fact, all three had never posted a top 10 World Cup result in their young careers. Of the three, Muzaton had the previous highest placing World Cup result – 11^th in the downhill at Kitzbuehel in 2015.

How did all this craziness unfold? It started with six inches of new snow overnight and a rock-solid slalom track, followed by more snow. Officials swapped the downhill and slalom events, running the slalom first and the downhill – which was moved to a lower start position – to later in the afternoon.

“Usually downhill (first) I’m more comfortable with… and then you can do the downhill and see where you stand and then go into the slalom.” said Squaw Valley’s Bryce Bennett, who finished 10^th. “But with the slalom first, you definitely have to perform to get a better position for the downhill. It’s a little bit more pressure to perform in slalom.”

Hintermann was 23^rd in the slalom and started eighth in the downhill. After moving atop the leaderboard, snow started falling again, which significantly slowed the track for the remaining starters, including Bennett, thereby penalizing those who performed well in the slalom.

“It was definitely challenging conditions,” Bennet said of his downhill run as heavy snow fell. “It started snowing pretty hard after about 10 guys and it definitely made the race interesting.”

Up next, more snow is in the forecast – upwards of 20 inches – for Wengen and Saturday’s downhill.

OFFICIAL RESULTS
Audi FIS Alpine Ski World Cup
Wengen, Switzerland – Jan. 13, 2017
Men’s Combined