A thunderous start to the season! Ester Ledecká left no one in doubt who dominates the slopes of alpine snowboarding in Mylin, China, and from the first place in qualification to the golden run in the final, she walked to her first triumph of the new season. After Saturday's first place in the parallel giant slalom, she added a fourth place in the parallel slalom at the inaugural World Cup after falling in the semi-final run and losing just 0.02 seconds in the battle for bronze. She leads the overall standings. The other Czechs did not qualify for the final.
The Chinese resort of Mylin hosted the first Alpine Snowboard World Cup of the new competition season with a rich Czech representation. Both parallel disciplines - slalom and giant slalom were competed.
Already in Saturday's Ledecká qualified by more than a second and a half in the parallel giant slalom against the second Polish, Aleksandra Krol-Walasová, and she continued her sovereign runs in the final. She missed the Netherlands' Michelle Dekker by more than three seconds in the second intermediate and finished for an unchallenged qualification.
Ledecká left the quarter-final in the blue track, in which she took almost a second on Switzerland's Ladina Caviezel, and she won the semi-final with Japan's Cubaki Miki by more than half a second.
In the final run she met the second qualifier Krol-Walasová, but Ledecká showed in the last run that she has no competition in Mylin. The difference of 1.67 seconds in the final run underlined Ledecka's fantastic performance, which added 100 points to her World Cup ranking.
In Mylin, Zuzana Maděrová narrowly missed out on the final heats, losing 0.8 hundredths of a second in 17th place. After the injury, which has been bothering Maděrová since April this year and threatened that she would not even be able to stand on the race track due to the pain, it was still a good start to the new season.
The other two Czech representatives, Adéla Keclíková and Klára Šonková, placed 30th and 31st respectively.
Kryštof Minárik was 31st among men, Adam Počinek was disqualified. The winner was Italian Edwin Coratti, who was defeated in the final by Korean Kim Sang-kyom. The third place was taken by another Korean representative I Sang-ho, the fourth place was taken by the local Jie Pi.
In Sunday's Ledecká found her only opponent in the form of Julia Zogg from Switzerland. In the final runs, she again had a great start, giving more than a second to Korea's Haeri Jeong and more than two seconds to Italy's Jasmin Coratti.
The key moment came in the semi-final run with Japan's Miki, during which Ledecká fell and despite trying to make up the loss, she was not able to keep up with her opponent at the finish line. In the small final, she was only 0.02 seconds behind her qualification winner Zogg. The winner was Austrian Sabine Payer.
Other Czechs did not find their way to the final. Maderova was third after the first qualification run, even ahead of Ledecka, but a fall in the second one gave her the final 29th place. Adéla Keclíková was 31st, Klára Šonková took 38th position.
Kryštof Minárik and 43. Adam Počinek. The winner was Italian Maurizio Bormolini, beating Austrian Benjamin Karl, with Italian Gabriel Messner finishing third.
The next Alpine Snowboard World Cup race in China is scheduled for next weekend in Yanqing, Beijing.
Current SP standings (after 2 races):
Women: 1. Ledecká 150, 2. Payerová 145, 3. Mikiová 140, ...22. Maderova 16, 35. Keclíková 1.
Men: 1. Bormolini 126, 2. Karl 109, 3. Coratti (It.) 100, ...34. Minarik 3.
Chinese weekend: alpine snowboarding at Mylin Valley Ski Resort in Chifeng, North China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, freestyle snowboarders at the Beijing Olympic Big Air jump.
Both Czech freestyle snowboarders they take points. Jakub Hroneš took 18th place on the Olympic hill. Kristian Salač finished 27th in his first start this season.
After a fantastic career fifth place at the last World Cup in Chur, Switzerland, Jakub Hrones achieved a good result at the next stop of the elite freestyle snowboarding series in Beijing. In the Big Air qualification he took the final 11th place in his heats and finished 18th overall.
Kristian Salač had his first World Cup start in Beijing this season. And on his debut he finished 27th overall with 120 points.
In Sunday's race Tormod Frostad from Norway and French skier Tess Ledeux won. Twenty-two-year-old Frostad collected 183.00 points to seal his victory, while Italy's Miro Tabanelli finished second with a loss of 0.75 points. Third place went to Canadian Dylan Deschamps with 181.00 points.
In the women's competition, Ledeux, silver medallist at the Beijing Winter Olympics, took the podium with 168.25 points, Sarah Hoefflin of Switzerland finished second with 163.00 points and 17-year-old Flora Tabanelli of Italy was third.
czech-ski.com/ Xinhua/ gnews - RoZ
PHOTO - Xinhua/Zhang Chenlin
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