Austria’s Marcel Hirscher is travelling with a total of 525 World Cup points to Adelboden, in Switzerland, where the next technical events remain scheduled for this weekend despite difficult weather conditions in that part of the Swiss Alps.
The only 22-year-young racer from nearby Salzburg has achieved an impressive season start so far with his three wins and two podium finishes in giant slalom and slalom. He has also been once 5th, once 6th and only skied out once at Flachau on home soil prior the Christmas break.
During the post-race press conference at Zagreb, many reporters were curious to know if the prodigious gate specialist was reflecting at all about the Overall World Cup standings that he is again leading after his great accomplishment in Zagreb-Sljeme. The very articulate young man was straight forward about his chances to battle for final victory against other top favorites as Ivica Kostelic or Aksel Lund Svindal.
“It’s not impossible for a GS and slalom skier to clinch the World Cup but still very hard,” he told the press. “You surely need to amass a lot of big points but as the season is still long I don’t want to think about it for the moment,” he added. “My goal is to focus hard on the next race and do the best out of it. When you move at your limits, it’s very easy to make a mistake. You can also be suddenly sick and there are a lot of speed races and combined events ahead us. For the moment I only plan to enter the technical events. It’s already enough for me at my age. I’m still young and need to improve my experience in the other disciplines. Come back to me early March – then we’ll see more!”
With twelve technical races lefts until the end of the season, Hirscher can for sure continue adding lots of heavy points in the coming weeks and months. With a total of 45 events planned this season (without the cancelled city event at Munich) the Overall winner is expected to score more than 1,400 points this winter. Last year, Ivica Kostelic scored a total of 1,356 points after his fantastic campaign which included seven win within a month in January.
The Croatian is not far behind Hirscher prior the competitions in Adelboden – 136 points – and he should be able to score many of them in the up-coming combined in Wengen or Kitzbuehel. Yet the defending Overall champion has not recovered his best form so far in giant slalom and in the speed events after losing several weeks of crucial technical spring training last year because of his latest knee surgery.
The last champions having captured the big Crystal globe after focusing on two specialties only are France’s Luc Alphand in 1997 and Italy’s ‘La Bomba’ - Alberto Tomba - in 1995. Alphand who has won six downhill and Super-G races that season, scored a total of 1,130 points and Tomba, who celebrated eleven triumphs in Gs and slalom that winter including three in a three consecutive days, 1,150.
A healthy and consistent Marcel Hirscher can reach that amount – especially if he decided in the last minutes to enter a Super-combined in Chamonix or in Sochi! In recent years, Marcel reached twice the podium in a Super-combined at Val d’Isère (with a Super-G and a slalom) and he has the capacity to master a technical course if needed.
The giant slalom at Adelboden – the last for a long period – could be a turning point for other favorites too – such as last year’s winner Svindal who has not found back his best rhythm yet in the event and in downhill.
Marcel Hirscher is surely not afraid by the challenges he is facing – at 22, he is just aiming to ski as fast as possible and fully enjoy all the risks he is taking as it was ther case Thursday evening at Zagreb-Sljeme. He strongly reminds us Italy’s’ wonderboy’ Piero Gros who was 19 when he clinched the big globe beating by a few points only his famous teammate Gustavo Thoeni !
PkL
