VAL d’ISÈRE, France (AP) — Swiss skier Marco Odermatt posted the fastest time in the opening run of a men’s World Cup giant slalom on Saturday.
Odermatt best handled challenging course conditions on the Face de Bellevarde following overnight snowfall to lead defending overall champion Alexis Pinturault by .32 and Croatian skier Filip Zubcic by .33 of a second.
GS world champion Mathieu Faivre trailed by .85 in fourth.
Course workers moved up to 50 centimeters of fresh snow out of the race line in the early morning hours.
“We all knew that it would be very tough, that it would be a fight. I tried to have a clever run: a little bit aggressive and only pushing where possible,” Odermatt said.
The Swiss skier leads the overall standings with 346 points, 36 ahead of Matthias Mayer and 117 ahead of Aleksander Aamodt Kilde, who both sat out Saturday’s race.
Odermatt is chasing his third win of the season. He triumphed in the giant slalom in Austria in October and can become the first male skier to win the first two GS races in a season since Ted Ligety achieved the feat in 2013.