“It's a bit mind-boggling to say that at the Olympics where only the first three places count, but I want to be satisfied.
“ Alexis Pinturault will not have a third medal on the Olympic giant after his two bronze in Sochi and Pyeongchang, but no question for the Frenchman to pull the mug this Sunday.
Fifth in the giant slalom at the Beijing Olympics tied with his compatriot Thibaut Favrot and 25 hundredths from the bronze of Mathieu Faivre, the Courchevel skier dried his tears from the alpine combined, left Thursday with a fall in slalom and an injury to the 'right shoulder.
"I took all the medication I could to feel it as little as possible," says the winner of the last Big Crystal Globe.
Bothered by his contusion and the morning conditions mixing blocked horizon and snowfall, Alexis Pinturault applied himself to stay in the nails, with an eleventh place on the first heat.
Before letting go more on the second to set the fourth fastest time and enter this top 5.
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I miss a bit today to get a medal, but I'm in the fight.
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"The first season where I'm really in the hard"
The one who admits to having “grit his teeth” over the two rounds is approaching the home stretch of his Olympics without having won any medals.
His two specialties, the giant and the alpine combined, are behind him and his inaugural super-G ended in eleventh place.
“I have almost ten years of career, 75 podiums, 35 victories, more than ten world and Olympic medals, but this is the first season where I am really in the hard, loose the one who still has not won this winter.
I was hoping for the Games to be a bit of a breath of fresh air, but they reflect my season.
I have to take the positive, otherwise I risk sinking a little deeper into the hole.
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He still remains in the tricolor the slalom on Wednesday, a discipline where he will be an outsider at best.
"If it had been the slalom (Editor's note: more demanding on the upper body), it would have been difficult today," he explains.
But there, I have three days to continue to recover.
I will be at the start, that's for sure.
“To try to save the difficult Olympics for the one who was the best skier in the world last year.
