LEVI, Finland (AP) — Slovakian skier Petra Vlhova led the opening run of the first women’s World Cup slalom of the season Saturday, with Mikaela Shiffrin looming in third position.
The American, who raced with a bruised left knee following a training crash last week, had a clean run and briefly led the race until Lena Duerr of Germany clocked the fastest times in the flat last section of the Levi Black course to beat the American by 0.18 seconds.
Vlhova, who is the Olympic champion in the discipline, was the last starter of the top-seven ranked slalom skiers and finished 0.42 ahead of Shiffrin.
“I feel quite happy with my first run,” said Shiffrin, adding the training accident did not affect her in the race.
“It’s not perfect, but it’s not holding me back from skiing strong,” she said. “Last week, we did a really good job to push into a kind of training in the gym, trying different things, different loading. By Thursday, I was able to do a full intensity training session.”
In an Instagram post the day before the race, Shiffrin said she felt “quite good now” after “she took a fair amount of impact through my left knee” when she straddled a gate and crashed during slalom training.
“I’m lucky (and so very grateful) to have come away with a bone bruise but no other major damage,” said Shiffrin, who won both slaloms here last year on her way to winning the discipline title for the seventh time and was chasing a record-extending 89th career World Cup win.
No skier other than the American or Vlhova has won the traditional season-opening slalom in Finnish Lapland since then-overall champion Tina Maze of Slovenia triumphed in 2014.
“I felt good with good confidence,” said Vlhova, who started the season by finishing third in a giant slalom in Austria two weeks ago in a race where Shiffrin placed sixth.
On Saturday, the leading trio was well ahead of the rest of the field, with fourth-placed Katharina Liensberger of Austria more than a second off the pace.
Laurence St-Germain, who beat Shiffrin to the slalom world title last February, trailed by 3.57 seconds and the Canadian skier failed to qualify for the second run later Saturday.
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