The Albany Gazette - Norway's Haugan leads Kitzbuehel slalom

In pouring rain, Haugan clocked 51.29 seconds down the Ganslern slope in the Austrian resort.

France's Steven Amiez was second fastest down in testing conditions in 51.36sec, while Lucas Pinheiro Braathen was third (+0.25sec).

Pinheiro Braathen used to compete for Norway before switching allegiance to Brazil, the country of his mother and where he lived for some time as a child.

His placing left him in contention to bag a first-ever World Cup win for the South American country.

Defending champion Linus Strasser of Germany was ninth (+0.76), while Switzerland's two-time winner (2020, 2023) Daniel Yule was at 0.65sec.

France's 2019 winner Clement Noel sat fourth (+0.30), but 2022 champion Dave Ryding of Britain has a daunting 1.50sec deficit to make up in the second leg scheduled for 1230 GMT.

"God save Dave!" bellowed the slopside commentator as the British veteran pivoted out of the start hut.

Other skiers to finish within a second of Haugan included Switzerland's Tanguy Nef, Norway's Atle Lie McGrath, Italy's Alex Vinatzer, France's Paco Rassat, Croatian Filip Zubcic and the vaunted Austrian trio of Marco Schwarz, Manuel Feller and Fabio Gstrein.

There was, however, a disaster for former two-time winner and current slalom standings leader Henrik Kristoffersen, the Norwegian skiing out high up the course to bring his day to a premature end.

And Austria's Michael Matt, who won world silver in 2019 and a bronze at the 2018 Pyeongchang Olympics, also failed to make it down.

There is a 100,000-euro ($104,800) cheque for the winner on the Ganslern slope, next to the Streif, where the downhill and super-G were held over the last 48 hours and won by Canadian James Crawford and Switzerland's Marco Odermatt respectively.

(F.Jackson--TAG)