Sawt Falasteen - Champion Odermatt opens season with win at wintry Soelden

"The perfect start," said Odermatt at the finish after exploiting a second-run error by Marco Schwarz to win by 0.24 seconds.

After the women opened the season on Saturday with their giant slalom on the Austrian glacier, the men battled poor visibility and welcome wintry weather in their traditional curtain raiser.

After Swiss star Odermatt topped the first run in 58.18 seconds, edging Austrian Schwarz by one hundredth of a second in the first round, heavy snow began to fall, delaying the second run by an hour.

Odermatt collected the giant slalom title last season as well as the super-G, downhill and overall titles.

In the second run, Schwarz started extremely fast but lost almost a second after a mid-run error and finished in only the the 19th-fastest time of a tricky second run. He sneaked past Norwegian Atle Lie McGrath into second by 0.03 seconds but left the door open for Odermatt, running last on a deteriorating surface.

The Swiss went down in 57.85 seconds, 0.92sec slower than the best second run of Raphael Haaser, but it was enough to edge Schwarz by 0.24 seconds overall.

"It was very good for getting into the season," Odermatt said. "Towards the end of last season it got a little bit more difficult in GS. I really started to focus again on GS this prep season, so it was worth it and I'll take the good feelings into the speed events."

Schwarz, who struggled with injury last season, recorded his first podium finish since December 2023.

Z.Ramadan--SF-PST