First day of racing goes to Austria’s Nina Astner
The snowfall of the last few hours accompanied the opening day of competition at the Women’s Alpine Skiing Europa Cup in Sestriere, providing ideal winter conditions on the slopes of the Vialattea ski area and helping to make today’s giant slalom even more technical and demanding.
On the Kandahar Giovanni Alberto Agnelli course, athletes from 16 nations faced off in a particularly selective race, requiring great adaptability, precision and technical consistency in both runs. The snow, a valuable asset for the area and for the ski season, enhanced the technical characteristics of the slope, raising the level of the sporting challenge.
On this first day, Austria’s Nina Astner, already leading after the first run, secured victory with the fastest combined time of 2:19.94, ahead of Switzerland’s Dania Allenbach, who finished 0.54 seconds back. Third place on the podium went to Sweden’s Hilma Loevblom, who produced a fine comeback in the second run to finish 1.14 seconds behind.
The Italian athletes, after their early-season successes on the continental circuit, did not reach the podium today but still stood out with strong performances: Ambra Pomarè and Sophie Mathiou finished joint fifth, posting identical times over the two runs and emerging as the best Italians in the race. Behind them, Laura Steinmair placed 8th and Carole Agnelli 11th.
«Weather conditions also represented a significant challenge from an organisational point of view, but thanks to the great work carried out by the staff and the piste crews we were able to ensure the event ran smoothly. Snow is a fundamental element for our ski area and today it helped to make the competition even more selective, fully in line with Europa Cup standards,» commented Gualtiero Brasso, head of the Sporting Club Sestrieres Organising Committee, at the end of the race.
The Women’s Europa Cup will return to the slopes tomorrow, Saturday 10 January, for the second giant slalom on the programme, with the same race format: first run at 10:00 and second run at 13:00. The competitions will once again be broadcast live on neveitalia.it and on the official Vialattea YouTube channel.
