Cortina d'Ampezzo (Italy) (AFP)

Mathieu Faivre, in difficulty for several seasons, created a sensation by becoming the giant's world champion on Friday three days after his parallel title while his compatriot Alexis Pinturault, huge favorite, went out for one of the biggest disillusions of his career.

Mathieu Faivre dominates a completely unexpected podium.

The Italian Luca De Aliprandini is 2nd at 63/100 and the Austrian Marco Schwarz 3rd at 87/100.

None of these three skiers has been on a giant podium this season.

He arrived on tiptoe, Mathieu Faivre leaves double world champion.

No podium since October 2019. No victory since December 2016 in Val d'Isère, the only one of his career.

World number two of the giant in 2017, Mathieu Faivre, sent home prematurely after the giant of the Olympic Games in 2018, has been looking for himself for nearly four years.

In two weeks he had a spectacular rebirth.

It was there, in training in particular in Reiteralm (Austria) that he found his ski renowned on the circuit for its finesse and accuracy, thanks to some adjustments on the equipment and in the head.

The 29-year-old from Nice, sometimes skittish, for a long time angry with a reference medium in alpine skiing, begins Tuesday with the friendly but little individual parallel, offered for the first time at the Worlds.

Not favorite, he wins, rejoices, but biding his time for his "real" race, the giant, his only specialty.

On a very demanding track, he was able to remain the most solid Friday, making as few mistakes as possible to take all the sun of Cortina d'Ampezzo for himself.

While he was used to the shadow of his glorious rival and compatriot Alexis Pinturault.

A year after a first title, he finished 3rd at the World Juniors in 2011, when Pinturault was crowned him.

Pinturault then stormed onto the circuit and gradually became one of the best French skiers in history, leaving Faivre far behind even in his good years.

- Pinturault at fault -

Friday, after having cut the first round and most of his opponents, Pinturault started last as he usually does (12 wins after 15 best times in the first round in the World Cup).

But a fault sent him to the mat from the first gates causing amazement in the finish area.

After two medals in the super-G (bronze) then the combined (silver), he had everything to succeed in the dream Worlds.

There remains for the moment this hole in his big list, this lack of title or giant globe, his best discipline, where he has 17 World Cup victories.

The Savoyard has several reasons to re-mobilize quickly: the slalom, from Sunday, where he is an outsider, then the quest for the big crystal globe.

Leading two-thirds of the season, he is favorite to become the first Frenchman to win the major title in alpine skiing since Luc Alphand in 1997.

Never mounted on a podium in his career, Luca De Aliprandini delighted the few spectators and saved Italy from Worlds for the moment disastrous.

The Austrian Marco Schwarz showed him once again his great form, after his title on the combined on Monday.

He is the favorite in Sunday's slalom.

© 2021 AFP