Industry News
Saturday, December 14, saw the first-ever women’s Downhill World Cup at Beaver Creek, Colorado. Victory went to Austria’s Cornelia Hütter, with Italy’s Sofia Goggia claiming second place and Switzerland’s Lara Gut-Behrami rounding out the podium in third place.
It was a fantastic day today at Beaver Creek with sunshine and a cheerful crowd out to celebrate the world’s fastest female skiers. To start the exciting first-ever women’s Downhill on the Birds of Prey course today, Lindsey Vonn made her return to the World Cup as a forerunner. While Vonn’s time is not officially recorded, her time is hand-timed, and came in at 1:34.10 minutes. This would have seen Vonn place inside the top 20 (hand- times vary from automated timing by several milliseconds, so are tough to compare without further timing data). The adoring homecrowd cheered loudly for the legendary ski racer who has not been seen at a World Cup race in almost six years.
First skier on the Birds of Prey course today was Laura Gauche who set the pace at 1:34.75 minutes. Kira Weidle-Winkelmann, unfortunately, did not start due to illness, while Austria’s Priska Ming-Nufer snatched the lead from Gauche by more than a whole second. With that impressive lead, Ming-Nufer remained in the leader’s seat until Sofia Goggia entered the race. Goggia is coming back from a complicated tibial fracture in January this year with which she had been struggling with until September at which point she had the plate removed from her leg to alleviate shin pain during training runs. The Italian “Queen of Speed” showed just why she carried that title and catapulted herself into the lead more than a second ahead of the Austrian, with a time of 1:32.54 minutes. Likewise, Switzerland’s Gut-Behrami looked strong after missing earlier races so far this season due to issues with her knee, but the Swiss skier could not beat Goggia, crossing the finish line 0.18 seconds behind the Italian. The lead seemed firmly in Goggia’s hand with skier after skier failing to even get near her time until Hütter snatched the lead by 0.16 seconds from the Queen of Speed.
Lauren Macuga from Team USA narrowly missed out on a podium, finishing 0.18 seconds behind Lara Gut-Behrami in fourth place in what is a personal best for the young American ski racer. Macuga had shown strong training runs in the lead-up to the actual race. Macuga finished the 2023-24 season with a personal best fifth place in Super-G in Kvitfjell, Norway, in March 2024, however, this is the first time Macuga has finished in the top 10 in Downhill. Lauren Macuga comes from a family of successful wintersport athletes, with her sister Alli competing for Team USA in the Moguls World Cup and her brother Sam in the U.S. Ski Jumping Team (and another brother hoping to make the national team).
Macuga’s teammate Breezy Johnson finished today’s Downhill in 13th place. Johnson has just returned to the World Cup circuit following a 14-month ban by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) due to a failure to comply with the Whereabouts Rule. The Whereabouts Rule requires athletes to register their location in the USADA database. Accurate whereabouts information is crucial for effective out-of-competition testing, which helps deter and detect doping by enabling no-notice sample collection. Johnson failed to comply a total of three times during a 12-month window, resulting in the ban by USADA.
Related: U.S. Ski Racer Breezy Johnson Hit With 14-Month Ban by U.S. Anti-Doping Agency
Also finishing inside the top 30 was teammate Jacqui Wiles, who came in 29th, relegating teammate Keely Cashman by 18 seconds to 31t place. Bells Wright finished in 35th place while Tricia Mangan came 39th, and Haley Cutler came 42nd.
Special mention must also go to Austria’s Ricarda Haaser tho skied with bib 37 into fifth place, just 0.04 seconds behind Macuga. The 31-year-old did not compete in Downhill last season but has shown strong training runs at the Birds of Prey course in the lead-up to the race. Moving from 37th to fifth won Haaser the Stifel Bibbo Award, which comes with $5,000 prize money.
The races at Beaver Creek continue tomorrow, Sunday, December 15, with a Super-G event.
