Federica Brignone won her first race this season with the World Cup Super G in Val di Fassa (Italy) on Sunday, where she edged Switzerland's Lara Gut-Behrami, who took the opportunity to secure the small globe of the specialty.
The Italian, defending champion in the general classification, beat Gut-Behrami by 59 hundredths and another Swiss, Corinne Suter, by 72 hundredths in a race marked by two long interruptions.
Norway's Kajsa Vickhoff Lie first fell mid-course before rushing into the safety nets and being strongly shaken, requiring an interruption of more than 20 minutes to be evacuated by helicopter.
Austrian Rosina Schneeberger, bib 21, then violently crashed into a door at the top of the course before finishing her race also in the safety nets, screaming in pain, before being taken to hospital.
Brignone's rebound after nightmarish Worlds
Federica Brignone therefore waited a long time before being able to celebrate her first victory of the winter.
After an exceptional 2019/2020 season, it had a much more discreet winter (four podiums so far) marked in particular by catastrophic Worlds.
Much awaited in Italy in Cortina d'Ampezzo, Brignone (30) had multiplied the disillusions there in February.
After an average Super G (10th), she fell from the first gates of the combined slalom when she had set the best time in the speed heat, before finishing the parallel (6th) in tears, eliminated by her compatriot Marta Bassino on a race she deemed unfair.
She had continued her nightmare with two jumps off the track in giant and slalom.
After two average runs on Friday (17th) and Saturday (23rd), she finally lit up her season with a 16th victory in her career to equal Deborah Compagnoni's national record for women.
Lara Gut-Behrami takes off
However, it remains far from the best in the general classification (5th), where Lara Gut-Behrami took off on Sunday.
The Swiss, three times medalist at Cortina (gold in super-G and giant, bronze in downhill) continued her exceptional series started on January 23 with 11 podiums now in her last 12 races.
She also took advantage of the poor performance of the Slovak Petra Vlhova, out of points (32nd) because of a big mistake, to overtake her by 187 lengths in the race to the big globe.
Thanks in particular to his four victories this season, Gut-Behrami also won the small globe of the specialty, the third of his career, while there is still a super-G to play in March.
Corinne Suter signed behind her her 7th podium of the season, the 3rd in three days at Val di Fassa (3rd and 2nd of the two descents).
Tessa Worley finished 9th at 1''49 and Tiffany Gauthier 17th at 1''77.
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