Paris (AFP)
The Men's Alpine Skiing World Cup is attacking a decisive month for the conquest of the big Crystal Globe with six slaloms in January, a marathon which begins this weekend in Zagreb (Croatia).
It is the ladies who will open the competition on Saturday with a slalom as well, in one of the rare "mixed" stages of the calendar. Having won thirteen of the last fourteen races in this discipline, the American Mikaela Shiffrin and her 64 World Cup victories is an immense favorite and should fly in January to a fourth big consecutive Crystal Globe.
In men's, January offers a slower pace for slalomers with six races including the most prestigious on the circuit (Zagreb, Madonna di Campiglio, Adelboden, Wengen, Kitzbühel then Schladming). The most versatile skiers will also have a giant (Adelboden), a combined (Wengen) or even a super-G (Kitzbühel) in their program.
It is obviously the slalom globe that will be played during this sequence but also the race for the big Globe. In the third of the season, with 8 "speed" races against 5 "techniques" (plus a combined), the downhill and super-G specialists have the upper hand: the Norwegian Aleksander Aamodt Kilde (474 points) leads the ranking ahead of Italian Dominik Paris (454 points).
But with the retirement of the eight-time Austrian title holder Marcel Hirscher, the two big favorites for the supreme title Henrik Kristoffersen (379 points) and Alexis Pinturault (401 points) must take advantage of this month.
The Frenchman remains on a brilliant victory in Val d'Isère three weeks ago. But in this discipline, it is the Norwegian who has the best record with sixteen World Cup victories including the opening this season in Levi (Finland) and the world of the specialty in 2016, against three World Cup victories for Pinturault.
Zagreb World Cup program (Croatia):
Saturday, January 4: women's slalom, 1st round at 1:00 p.m., 2nd round at 4:15 p.m.
Sunday January 5: men's slalom, 1st run at 2:15 p.m., 2nd round at 5:40 p.m.
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