KEYSTONE
Wendy Holdener narrowly misses her third World Cup victory in slalom. In Kranjska Gora, the Swiss finished second behind the Croatian Zrinka Ljutic and ahead of the Swede Anna Swenn Larsson. Camille Rast (4th) and Mélanie Meillard (5th) are two other Swiss women present in the top 5.
After two solid races, Holdener was 16 hundredths away from his first victory in over two years. Holdener started the race in penultimate place ahead of Ljutic, who had set the same time in the morning and was more than a second ahead at the finish. But Ljutic mastered the course, which was more winding than the first round, just as impressively.
Rast and Meillard also close to the podium
Behind Holdener, other Swiss skiers took advantage of the absence of Mikaela Shiffrin, Petra Vlhova and other top skiers to achieve top results. Camille Rast and Mélanie Meillard finished just off the podium in 4th and 5th places. Eliane Christen entered the top 15 for the second time in a row in fifteenth place, Elena Stoffel (18th), Janine Mächler (21st) and Michelle Gisin (28th) completed this strong team result.
Ljutic, for his part, followed up his first World Cup victory with a successful double. The designated successor to 20-year-old Janica Kostelic had already won the last slalom before the start of the year in Semmering. With the double, she also took the lead in the slalom World Cup ahead of Camille Rast. After half the races, the gap between the two is four points, with Holdener already behind. In the general classification of the World Cup, Ljutic is now ahead of Sara Hector and Rast.
