Los Angeles (AFP) – Swiss star Marco Odermatt clinched his third consecutive Alpine Skiing World Cup overall title on Saturday with a masterful performance to win the giant slalom at Palisades Tahoe in California.
The 26-year-old secured the third crystal globe of his career after finishing with a combined time of 2min 11.69sec, just 12 hundredths of a second ahead of Norway’s Henrik Kristoffersen.
River Radamus of the United States was third with a time of 2:13.06.
Odermatt’s victory was the 35th World Cup win of his career and his 11th of the season, which has included 10 straight wins in giant slalom.
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The Swiss prodigy remains on track to win the grand slam in the discipline if he wins the four remaining giant slaloms left on the calendar — a feat not achieved since Swedish legend Ingemar Stenmark completed a clean sweep in the 1978-1979 season.
In the meantime, Odermatt was left celebrating a victory on Saturday which assured him of a third crystal globe. The Swiss’s latest win left him an unassailable 1,001 points clear of Austrian runner-up Manuel Feller in the overall standings.
Feller finished eighth on Saturday.
“It was super tight, I didn’t have the best feeling on the skis but I knew that at the end in the last sector I could ski fast — and that’s what I needed to do today,” Odermatt said.
Odermatt was set on the road to victory after clocking the fastest time in Saturday’s opening run, only for Kristoffersen to come roaring into contention with a blistering time of 1:05.18 in his second run.
But Odermatt proved equal to the challenge on his last run, crossing in 1:05.21 to clinch victory.
