Alpine Skiing news - Mikaela Shiffrin wins first Downhill for over two years

The course in Bansko was fiendishly tricky and saw three of the first ten skiers out of the gates fail to finish.

That included bib number one Michelle Gisin as well as Sofia Goggia and Tamara Tippler as 16 skiers in total crashed out in one form or another.

Technical specialist Shiffrin benefited from being slightly later out of the gate and was able to put together a run clocking in at 1:29.79.

She finished 0.18s ahead of Federica Brignone, her closest rival for the overall title with Joanna Haehlen in third.

It is Shiffrin’s first Downhill win since her first victory which came in December 2017 at Lake Louise.

It is her 65th overall World Cup win, just two behind Marcel Hirscher, and it is her first win in Bulgaria, meaning she has now won in 16 different countries which is more than any skier ever.

There was good news for fellow tech skier Petra Vlhova who finished sixth, like Shiffrin taking advantage of starting later and watching rivals crash out.

Friday’s Downhill was a replacement for the cancelled one at Val d’Isere so there will be a second Downhill on Saturday followed by a Super-G on Sunday.

Meanwhile in the men’s Super-G at Kitzbuhel Kjetil Jansrud beat out Norwegian team-mate Aleksander Aamodt Kilde and Austria’s Matthias Mayer for the victory.

Jansrud was beaten out in the last Super-G, before Christmas at Val Gardena, but skied well for his 13th Super-G victory.

It was the first race after Dominik Paris was ruled for the first of the season with a knee injury.