After the first run Olympic champion Giuliano Razzoli is in the lead. The Italian celebrated his career first World Cup win one year ago on the Zagreb mountain Sljeme, his only World Cup victory until now. For Razzoli, Zagreb definitely seems to be a good place. He also earned his very first podium here placing third in 2009.
Razzoli distanced the local hero Ivica Kostelic by 0.22 seconds. The winner of the parallel slalom in Munich takes another attempt to finally capture a home victory. Neither he nor his sister Janica have been able do that. In 2008 and 2009, Ivica Kostelic was second.
Silvan Zurbriggen is a 0.75 seconds behind Razzoli in eighth place. After the Swiss racer omitted the city event in Munich to intensively train slalom instead, Zurbriggen could regain the overall lead in the World Cup in Zagreb with a good second run.
Benjamin Raich of Austria is third, 0.44 seconds behind the leader. The 4th placed Swede Andre Myhrer, who already took second in the season opening slalom in Levi, finished just off the podium only 2 hundredths of a second behind Raich. France’s Julien Lizeroux follows another hundredth of a second behind Myhrer in fifth.
The second run promises to be exciting as the top 10 racers are separated by only 0.89 seconds.
Stay tuned for the second run of the men’s night slalom in Zagreb and more racing action at 18:00 CET.
