Riesch beats Vonn at home - Janka takes World Cup lead
Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany (dpa) - Maria Riesch beat Lindsey Vonn in her home town downhill on Wednesday to keep the women′s skiing World Cup title race alive with three races left.
The men′s title is also still up for grabs, with Carlo Janka taking the overall lead from Benjamin Raich with his win on the opening day of the World Cup finals at the 2011 worlds host town.
Germany′s Riesch, a double Olympic champion last month in Whistler, blazed down the 2.920-kilometres Kandahar piste in 1 minute 34.82 seconds.
The Olympic downhill champ Vonn of the US was second in 1:35.30 and retirement-bound Anja Paerson of Sweden third in 1:35.95 minutes.
By winning for the third time in the season and 14th time overall, Riesch kept her World Cup chances but, given a 225-point deficit, they are more of a theoretical nature.
Vonn has 1,571 points and Riesch 1,346, with Paerson out of contention in third place with 982 points. A victory is worth 100 points.
"I have written off the issue. Lindsey would have crash out three times, that is impossible ... I have to be realistic. With my two Olympic golds I can live with second place in the World Cup," said the Garmisch-born Riesch, who was delighted with her performance.
"If Lindsey trails by almost half a second then I really had a good run," she said. "It is the world championship piste for next year. It is great to know that I can ski well there."
Vonn can wrap up a third straight overall title on Thursday in the giant slalom. Already assured of the downhill crown ahead of Wednesday′s race, Vonn topped the final standings with 725 points from Riesch (556) and Paerson (385).
The men′s title race, meanwhile, could well go down to the wire after Janka conquered the 3,300-metres Kandahar piste with a vertical drop of 920m in 1:58.45 minutes for his fifth season victory and eighth overall.
Mario Scheiber of Austria was just two hundredths off the pace on 1:48.47, bad news for the Austrian men who had a first winless downhill season since 1992.
Swiss Patrick Kueng and Eric Guay of Canada clocked 1:48.52 for joint third place as the top eight were separated by just 0.19 seconds.
"I knew that something was possible today. I had to make the podium to keep my chances in the World Cup," said the world and Olympic giant slalom champion Janka.
Janka tops the World Cup with 1,073 points heading into the final three races. Raich, who did not race on Wednesday, has 1,019 points and Swiss Didier Cuche 878 for a theoretical title chance.
"Now I must try get a bigger cushion tomorrow (Thursday′s super-g) because Benni is normally better in the technical disciplines," said Janka.
Cuche was already assured of the downhill crystal trophy ahead of the race and finished the season with 528 points from eight downhills after coming eighth on the day. Janka has 448 points and Italy′s Werner Heel has 292. dpa jb bw