Fri 17/01 - Wengen men's Super-Combined

Big weekend starting today with men's Super-Combined - one slalom run followed by a Super-G run.
Let me say Wengen is the best course of the Tour, or at least it's my favourite one.

Picks for the Super-Combi

I find a little strange that Kostelic is so widely favourite to win, he's payed 2/1 against Pinturault's 6/1.
Kostelic at the moment doesn't worth the top 20 in slalom (though in the 2 runs), and his Super-G isn't any better. Both Pinturault and Ligety are better than the Croat in slalom although less reliable, and maybe they're even better in Super-G.
Frenchman Mermillod-Blondin looks like the closer to them: he finished 6th in a "real" Super-G at Beaver Creek, and he also races in "real" slaloms although he has never qualified for a second run so far this season. He was 3rd in Kitz Combi last year and Kitz Combi has 2 runs of slalom.

Here last results from Flachau, thanks Daum who got out at 3 gates from the finish line.

 
 

11-12/01 Weekend - Altenmark and Adelboden

(I know, I know... got a couple of lazy weeks...)

Interesting weekend, mostly because one of my favourite courses - Adelboden, with its breathtaking hump from which you can see the standings in the finish area, best camera angle of the Tour imo.
Giant-Slalom on Saturday and Slalom on Sunday for the men.
Ladies with a Downhill on Saturday (after only one training run) and a Super-Combined made of Super-G and a Slalom run


Here's my picks, for now. All on Saturday's ladies DH:

Hoefl-Riesch is favourite to win, honestly I don't know this DH but I don't think it's like Lake Louise.
Anyway Weirather, Gut and Elena Fanchini look all top competitor to me (along with Fenninger, who's odds are too low, though) and I fancy those pricese, above all Fanchini's ones: in 4 DHs she's been 3rd twice, 5th and a DNF.
And so I fancy them in head to heads: Weirather over Riesch; Gut over Maze, who's still far from the best shape; Fanchini over Goergl who's got nice Super-G results but hasn't backed them in Downhill.

I didn't find any good price for men's GS; I also have difficulties to read trends going on there: Ligety isn't the one he used to be last year - Olympics preapration maybe the cause - so Hirscher is closer same for the other topo one Pinturault, who though seems to lack of "the peak" to win.

Val d'Isere and St. Moritz

World Cup back in Europe
Ladies in St.Moritz: saturday a Super-G, sunday a giant-slalom
Men in Val d'Isere: giant-slalom on saturday, slalom on sunday

Footnote of a post from last year:
"In St.Moritz the slope offers a good variety for the GS.
In Val d'Isere very narrow slope but well steep... strange comebacks in run2"

Val d'Isere last year was thrilling. 
Local hero Pinturalt scored his first WC win in the night slalom, it was special because he won a slalom before winning in giant-slalom, his favourite discipline.
In giant-slalom Hirsher won in front of Luitz and Ligety. Scandal was Ligety not winning, the features of this slope and the course setting made everybody think they've finally found a way to stop him - he won the next GS, in Alta Badia, with one of the most terrific performances I've ever seen (you'll easily find the video on youporn or nearby, for a skiing fan there it belongs).  
Luitz was at his first WC podium - a year later the best he's placed is 9th two weeks ago in Beaver's GS - he was bib #35 (his compatriot Neureuther was bib #36 and finished 4th). Luitz was placed 25th after the first run, scored the best time in run2 to recover up to the 2nd position, Nani made another interesting recovery from 29th to 10th place.
St.Moritz lost the super-combined.
Last year Vonn won the super-G ahead of Maze, who won the giant-slalom and the combi. 
Vonn is not racing this year, Maze isn't the absolute dominator she used to be.
St. Moritz isn't particularly fashinating, it's average on many levels: lots of turns and "S", but not technical or challenging, fast but not even close to Lake Louise, some jumps but it's not Cortina. It's like a bigger version of a giant-slalom. Being the actual leader of giant-slalom the same of super-g I'm expecting the same names at the top: Gut, Riesch, Weirather, Fenninger

Picked some bets earlier, prices tempted me.

First three picks refers to saturday's SG.
It's Weirather - Fenninger again and I still see Weirather ahead.
I see value in both Suter and Riesch prices. Riesch on this course could be closer to Gut, while I had priced Suter favourite against Goergl.

Lindell-Vikarby vs Fenninger is from the giant-slalom market and I think this price is ridiculus and won't last long - Pinnacle makes Fenninger 1.7 to Vikarby 2.1.

Results of Sat 7/12 and American swing recap

Got a day short in posting and betting.
So this post will be a bit obsolete, but anyway...

Opposing the US didn't work, they actually showed signs of improvements in saturday's downhill and peaked yeasterday with Vonn finishing 5th in super-g.
The most disappointing thing of the weekend was skipping all the bets on Weirather after friday's lost ones. For the second DH there were the same odds in Weirather - Fenninger h2h market, and likely there were also for the SG.
Men's double was lost by just .02s thanks to a big run of Jansrud.

Weekend turn from profit to a 1.2 units lost and a ROI of -2.85%

----------------------------------------------------

Season finally getting on the heart: there will be races every weekend, but above all the fight for the standings is flareing up as contenders becoming more defined.

Ladies. Gut held on her WC lead on a course not suitable for her, runnind defensively in the two DHs and hit ting as soon as she could winning the SG.
Maria Riesch rose to the 2nd position, she easily dominated the DHs, but a big mistake in the SG prevented her from another solid placement. Being a top competitor also in slalom potentially she's winning big points in every event (super-combis and city-events included), she's now favourite to win the Crystal Globe.
Tied in third place Weirather and Fenninger are solid competitors, they are skiing at Gut's level and it's just a matter of time before they step on the top of the podium.
I'll limited the field of competitors to them. Maze and Shiffrin are more than 100 points behind Weirather/Fenninger, I'm about to rule them out with different reasons: Maze, as I said before, centered her summer preparation on the Olympics so she'll probably float mid-standing for another while, if form will eventually come she could have a Kostelic-like month although the lot of competitors has grown tougher in every discipline -hard task. Shiffrin runs for the win in slalom and giant-slalom, but though her regularity of results it's only two disciplines against Gut/Weirather/Fenninger's three and Riesch's four.

On men's side it's Svindal vs Hirsher again but with another character coming on the scene. Ted Ligety somehow increased the gap dividing him from the chasers in giant-slalom, and with solid super-gs and slaloms he could become an unexpected guest in the Cup fight.

Other interesting features: Bode and Vonn coming back, Janka and Jansrud as well.
Super-G surprise by Kueng (first Swiss win in centuries) and Otmar Striedinger
Italian speed team great form and GS team disaster, while France GS and speed are to be put back into perspective.

Alpine skiing - quick recap after season opening and 1/2 American swing - part 2 mens

In men's tour music didn't change from last year: Ligety still winning with margin on chasers in GS, same for Hirscher in SL, Svindal won in SG, and Paris the DH.

Overall

The fight for the Globe once again looks limited to Svindall, king of the fast disciplines, and Hirscher, king of the tech, with the austrian again andvantaged by the number of events (9 slaloms and downhills, 8 giant-slaloms, and only 6 super-gs, + 2 super-combi and a city-event).

Ligety should find more solidy in either slalom or super-g, or maybe he just should use better super-combies as he's one of the most completes and yet he scored 0 points in kombies lat year.

Pinturault potentially has the podium in his legs in slalom, but he lacks of consistency. Frequency of results there could turn him into a new Hirscher.

Kostelic looks far behind these. He is still fighting for top position in slalom, but the field there is wide and the points he is going to lose are more of those he is going to win there. Super-G and downhill hardly are taking him big points, above all compared to the risks he is taking competiting in those after all his knee surgery he underwent.

Comebacks: Miller, Lizeroux, Feuz 

Some big names came back this year. Honestly I can't see they win or find placements at the very top of the standing (at least not in the short period) but anyway for me it was a great pleasure to have them back as they all at some point in the past have represented the best of their specific discipline, or of skis in general - guess who am I talking about?.

Age isn't on Miller and Lizeroux's side while Feuz once he'll have scratch off the rust should become relevant again.

Up-and-comers 

Vinking Henrik Kristoffersen, 19 yo,  surely deserve the first mention. He was the surprise of Levi reaching his first WC podium behind Hirsher and Matt. Away from the major tour, he's backing that astonishing results with other good placements in European Cup and leading the overall standing.

Compatriot Sebastian-Foss Solevaag, older than Kristoffersen but with less WC starts, was another surprising youngster. 9th place in Levi where he was bib #55, and doing good in EC as well: 3rd and 2nd place in two slaloms.

Harder to find top-performing youngster in the fast disciplines, where maturity seems to arrive later.

Austrian Matthias Mayer grabbed 2nd place in SG and 13th in DH in Lake Louise, though he already is full-time part of the OSV from few season.

Freasher names are France's Brice Roger and Austria's Otmar Striedinger who got two top 20 placements in Lake Louise.

 

Schladming 2013 - Super-Combined Men

First, sorry I haven't been posting in past two days, it's hard for me to write up previews and postviews and do picks, that often go bad, and all....


Super-combi today: one run of dowhill starting at 12 (CET), and one run of Slalom at 18.15 so night event. Both runs on the original slopes. Key fact, slalom's course setter is french team, and so Pinturault's coach.

Starting list, remembering that slalom's run will have an invers order of the top 30 from downhill's run.
1 150495 VRABLIK Martin 1982 CZE Elan
2 194190 ROGER Brice 1990 FRA Rossignol
3 6530319 COCHRAN-SIEGLE Ryan 1992 USA Rossignol
4 30149 SIMARI BIRKNER Cristian Javier 1980 ARG Atomic
5 510997 BERTHOD Marc 1983 SUI Salomon
6 660021 DANILOCHKIN Yuri 1991 BLR 
7 150398 BANK Ondrej 1980 CZE Elan
8 510890 ZURBRIGGEN Silvan 1981 SUI Rossignol
9 180570 ROMAR Andreas 1989 FIN Atomic
10 50625 RAICH Benjamin 1978 AUT Atomic
11 53902 MAYER Matthias 1990 AUT Head
12 294277 KLOTZ Siegmar 1987 ITA Nordica
13 511352 VILETTA Sandro 1986 SUI Salomon
14 192746 THEAUX Adrien 1984 FRA Salomon
15 291459 PARIS Dominik 1989 ITA Nordica
16 51215 BAUMANN Romed 1986 AUT Blizzard
17 192504 MERMILLOD BLONDIN Thomas 1984 FRA Salomon
18 511313 JANKA Carlo 1986 SUI Atomic
19 293006 INNERHOFER Christof 1984 ITA Rossignol
20 421328 SVINDAL Aksel Lund 1982 NOR Head
21 194364 PINTURAULT Alexis 1991 FRA Salomon
22 380260 KOSTELIC Ivica 1979 CRO Fischer
23 561217 KOSI Klemen 1991 SLO Atomic
24 92534 CHONGAROV Nikola 1989 BUL Volkl
25 90131 GEORGIEV Georgi 1987 BUL Atomic
26 430429 BYDLINSKI Maciej 1988 POL Atomic
27 534562 LIGETY Ted 1984 USA Head
28 480736 KHOROSHILOV Alexander 1984 RUS Fischer
29 700830 ZAMPA Adam 1990 SVK Salomon
30 293550 MARSAGLIA Matteo 1985 ITA Rossignol
31 501439 HEDIN Douglas 1990 SWE Head
32 491129 TERRA Ferran 1987 SPA Rossignol
33 400281 VAN HEEK Marvin 1991 NED Salomon
34 20267 ESTEVE Kevin 1989 AND 
35 530165 BRANDENBURG Will 1987 USA Fischer
36 400016 WANDERS Arjan 1978 NED 
37 400237 MEINERS Maarten 1992 NED 
38 531452 BIESEMEYER Thomas 1989 USA Rossignol
39 20324 OLIVERAS Marc 1991 AND 
40 670052 KHUBER Martin 1992 KAZ 
41 561216 KLINE Bostjan 1991 SLO Stoeckli
42 170131 FAARUP Christoffer 1992 DAN 
43 670037 ZAKURDAEV Igor 1987 KAZ 
44 380341 ULLRICH Max 1994 CRO 
45 491151 DE LA CUESTA Paul 1988 SPA Salomon
46 430472 KLUSAK Michal 1990 POL Head
47 550022 RODE Roberts 1987 LAT 
48 710320 LAIKERT Igor 1991 BIH 
49 670029 PIMENOV Taras 1984 KAZ 
50 670058 KOSHKIN Dmitriy 1986 KAZ 
51 700868 FALAT Matej 1993 SVK 
52 690086 FESHCHUK Rostyslav 1990 UKR 
53 30283 FREEMAN CRESPO Ignacio 1992 ARG 


I've pointed out the hot names, being both runs on the original slopes the chances to win are equally distributed among downhiller and slalomist, obviously those with more overall skills are even hotter, and in this case the field is limited to Raich, Ligety, Pinturault and Kostelic.

Kostelic is favourite to win, he's ran the real downhill beside the training, but close following him there's Pinturault and Ligety.
The frenchmen might have the advantage of his coach setting the slalom's course, and also the fact that he's probably the best slalomist.
But Ted Ligety deserves equal attentions. The american seems to enjoy these slopes, his abilities and Giant-Slalom skills, his own characteristic style, the position of the external leg in large range turns, seems key elements to ski -or shred, like Ted would say- on this slopes.
In both previous combined in this season, Wengen, and Kitz, Ligety didn't reach the finish line, of the downhill in Kitz, of the slalom run in Wengen when making a good run, but bad luck he lost a ski when he was three/four gates away fron the finish line.
The importance of this event, together with the high confidence coming from an already won medal, can cheer him and keep him away from cheap mistakes. It's really hard to think him not reaching the podium also in a far-from-perfect-scenario.
Winner: Ligety 1 unit @7  Won +6

h2h Baumann - Mermillod-Blondin - pick Mermillod-Blondin 3 units @2 Lost -3
The frenchmen was third in the classic combined of Kitzbuehel (combined with 2 slalom runs).
Anyway he is a decent slalomist sure better than Baumann while the gap between these two can be little    after the downhill, as Baumann isn't in great form and wasn't even choosed for the real downhill race.

Svindal's current price (around 12) looks good for a trade, expecting him to have 2, maybe 3 seconds advantage after the downhill run.

Completely wrong the pick against Baumann, who's apparently worked around this event.

Schladming 2013 - Super-G Men

Day 2 at the world championships, and men in action.
This slope is not the same of ladies's one, for speed events.
Again, though, it's an easy one, without very hard section nor jumps... being wide many course can be set and course setting might be the key given it'll be done by Norvegian and Svindal's coach.

Last year's race isn't relevant. Late season race, with "rotten" snow, that early displayed mark. Low starting bibs were advantaged: 1st Innerhofer #8, 2nd Pinturault #5, 3rd Hirscher #2 (in one of his rare SG race), 4th Marsaglia #7.

Svindal is the big favoured and men to beat. He is SG Cup leader, in four SGs this season won three and made a second place.
Super-G is a strange discipline because it's a speed event but there are no time trial, there's a race inspection but you can't try gates at a race-like speed, so it's much about improvisation, it can be said you must know how to ski to compete in a Super-G. And actually Svindal know how to ski.

Behind Svindal there's Innerhofer. Beside being defending World Champion, and last year winner on this slope I don't give him so many chanches. He is in great shape but he may not like the snow conditions.

3rd favourite in Norway's no.2 Jansrud. Again he could be advantaged by the course setting (by his coach), but again he's been below the expectations so far in this season. He's often near the podium but no major results.

I see Reichelt as possible outsider. His raising form, the ability of austrian team in setting the skis (there will be different kind of snow on the course, I think only eskimos have a word to describe it all). He's one who can possibly put together all the technical elements needed in this race.

From the first group:
Klotz, is in good form but it's not a top racer.
Theaux, I like him, his aggressivity, but I don't trust him on this snow, sensibility more than angles will be required today.
Heel, about him I'd say the same of Theaux, though I think he's more overall skilled, I won't trust him but he's able of anything.
Mayer, being austrian, can be a possible outsider. And so could be for Streitberger and Baumann who, though, had a bad season... Championships focus for them? Who knows.
On this kind of snow canadians must be kept in high considerations.
Although their skills among turns aren't good enough there's their key racer Guay who's one of those able to give something more in important events.
And then there's Kostelic, who comes from three podiums in a row in three different disciplines: Slalom and Super-Combined in Kitz, and the city event in Moscow.
The croatian looks to be the one in the best shape, and although Super-G isn't his favourite discipline a good condition and confidence can drive to a good result, thing that actually happened in Garmish when Kostelic who the bronze medal in Super-G following that terrific january.

This said, here the picks:
Mayer to podium 1 unit @4 Lost -1
Reichelt to podium 2 units @3.5 Lost -1
Kostelic to podium 1 unit @11 Lost -1

Winner: Reichelt 1 unit @11 Lost -1

h2h Streitberger - Theaux - pick Streitberger 3 units @2.02 Lost -3
I don't really trust Streitberger, but I think Theaux won't like this snow  conditions.

-7
It's very disappointing to see a whole season work and "return of investmenst" to disappear in just two days.

Anyway there's to be happy for the analysis that were corrects.

Super-G podium on the Planai:
1) Ligety (USA), 2) De Tessieres (Fra), 3) Svindal (Nor)

The course was set like a real Super-Giant, so no surprise to see on the podium two Giant-Slalom specialist like Ligety and frenchmen De Tessieres. These two outsiders kicked my two "men" Reichelt and Mayer off the podium.

No excuses, both Ligety and De Tessieres made a great run and deserved their placements. Svindal recorded many "green" intermediate times but in the final section a little loss of balance and control resulted in a wider line and a loss of speed causing the 3rd placement.
De Tessieres displays the widest smile as he shouldn't neither race; GdT was the reserve of the french team, and only Clarey injury let him be in. As he said to Eurosport:

"Five days ago, I was down in the dumps at home. Unfortunately, Johan got injured. It's an odd feeling. But I really meant to do well, I was eager"  

No large smiles in two teams. Austria and Italy arrived with a great condition and great expectations.
Both came back withouth medals.
Austria still with no medals after the two Super-Gs. As Infostrada sport tweeted:

  Team Austria has had at least one medallist in the men's Super G race in 7 of the last 8 world championships. 

While Italy achieve the worst result of this season in Super-G: Innerhofer, 7th, couldn't defend Garmisch's golden medal; Marsaglia second in Super-G Cup Standing was 20th; and Heel was 22th


Video of the three best runs: Ligety, De Tessieres (at 1:47 min), Svindal (at 3:16 min, pay attention at 4:49)

Full standing (from FIS Official Site):

Rank	Bib	FIS Code	Name	Year	Nation	Total Time	FIS Points
1	10	534562	LIGETY Ted	1984	USA	1:23.96	0.00
2	4	191746	DE TESSIERES Gauthier	1981	FRA	1:24.16	2.50
3	22	421328	SVINDAL Aksel Lund	1982	NOR	1:24.18	2.75
4	19	50742	REICHELT Hannes	1980	AUT	1:24.51	6.88
5	16	53902	MAYER Matthias	1990	AUT	1:24.91	11.88
6	1	194364	PINTURAULT Alexis	1991	FRA	1:24.99	12.88
7	20	293006	INNERHOFER Christof	1984	ITA	1:25.05	13.63
8	13	51215	BAUMANN Romed	1986	AUT	1:25.17	15.13
9	21	192746	THEAUX Adrien	1984	FRA	1:25.21	15.63
10	12	50858	STREITBERGER Georg	1981	AUT	1:25.30	16.76
11	17	293550	MARSAGLIA Matteo	1985	ITA	1:25.35	17.38
12	14	102271	HUDEC Jan	1981	CAN	1:25.52	19.51
13	6	531452	BIESEMEYER Thomas	1989	USA	1:25.56	20.01
14	9	292455	FILL Peter	1982	ITA	1:25.60	20.51
15	25	6530319	COCHRAN-SIEGLE Ryan	1992	USA	1:25.63	20.88
16	28	102899	OSBORNE-PARADIS Manuel	1984	CAN	1:25.74	22.26
17	8	180570	ROMAR Andreas	1989	FIN	1:25.75	22.39
18	27	511139	KUENG Patrick	1984	SUI	1:25.88	24.01
19	32	103271	THOMSEN Benjamin	1987	CAN	1:25.93	24.64
20	11	292514	HEEL Werner	1982	ITA	1:26.00	25.51
21	7	192504	MERMILLOD BLONDIN Thomas	1984	FRA	1:26.11	26.89
22	23	294277	KLOTZ Siegmar	1987	ITA	1:26.27	28.89
23	15	102263	GUAY Erik	1981	CAN	1:26.30	29.26
24	36	201811	STECHERT Tobias	1985	GER	1:26.64	33.52
25	26	511313	JANKA Carlo	1986	SUI	1:26.73	34.64
26	29	510727	DEFAGO Didier	1977	SUI	1:26.81	35.64
27	35	561217	KOSI Klemen	1991	SLO	1:26.83	35.89
28	24	380260	KOSTELIC Ivica	1979	CRO	1:26.89	36.64
29	46	180534	SANDELL Marcus	1987	FIN	1:27.01	38.14
30	31	561216	KLINE Bostjan	1991	SLO	1:27.02	38.27
31	33	560447	SPORN Andrej	1981	SLO	1:27.04	38.52
32	39	501324	OLSSON Matts	1988	SWE	1:27.26	41.27
33	3	201606	KEPPLER Stephan	1983	GER	1:27.55	44.90
34	38	501439	HEDIN Douglas	1990	SWE	1:27.60	45.52
35	30	561067	PERKO Rok	1985	SLO	1:27.78	47.77
36	64	700830	ZAMPA Adam	1990	SVK	1:27.94	49.77
37	37	491151	DE LA CUESTA Paul	1988	SPA	1:28.48	56.53
38	49	92534	CHONGAROV Nikola	1989	BUL	1:28.61	58.15
39	45	410266	GRIFFIN Benjamin	1986	NZL	1:28.72	59.53
40	44	430429	BYDLINSKI Maciej	1988	POL	1:28.93	62.15
41	55	150495	VRABLIK Martin	1982	CZE	1:29.30	66.78
42	53	410372	PREBBLE Nick	1993	NZL	1:29.35	67.41
43	77	30246	BIRKNER KETELHOHN Jorge F.	1990	ARG	1:29.99	75.41
44	58	380341	ULLRICH Max	1994	CRO	1:30.02	75.79
45	43	20267	ESTEVE Kevin	1989	AND	1:30.20	78.04
46	56	92570	GEORGIEV Svetoslav	1991	BUL	1:30.23	78.41
47	52	670052	KHUBER Martin	1992	KAZ	1:30.32	79.54
48	70	710320	LAIKERT Igor	1991	BIH	1:30.66	83.79
49	67	430472	KLUSAK Michal	1990	POL	1:30.82	85.79
50	74	700868	FALAT Matej	1993	SVK	1:30.85	86.17
51	51	380318	BRIGOVIC Sebastian	1992	CRO	1:31.00	88.04
52	57	90131	GEORGIEV Georgi	1987	BUL	1:31.06	88.79
53	71	660021	DANILOCHKIN Yuri	1991	BLR	1:31.08	89.04
54	73	670037	ZAKURDAEV Igor	1987	KAZ	1:31.32	92.04
55	75	40506	ROBERTSON Sam	1993	AUS	1:31.77	97.67
56	50	170131	FAARUP Christoffer	1992	DAN	1:31.90	99.30
57	62	30149	SIMARI BIRKNER Cristian Javier	1980	ARG	1:32.02	100.80
58	76	670029	PIMENOV Taras	1984	KAZ	1:32.05	101.17
59	61	400235	WINKELHORST Steffan	1992	NED	1:32.14	102.30
60	81	690086	FESHCHUK Rostyslav	1990	UKR	1:32.76	110.05
61	66	40503	COULL Jackson	1993	AUS	1:33.08	114.05
62	68	380361	RODES Istok	1996	CRO	1:33.23	115.93
63	63	410334	PREBBLE Jamie	1991	NZL	1:33.76	122.56
64	72	550022	RODE Roberts	1987	LAT	1:34.35	129.94
65	80	690694	KOVBASNYUK Ivan	1993	UKR	1:35.98	150.32
66	78	110263	SUMPS Stephan	1988	CHI	1:38.42	180.84
Disqualified 1st run
	82	240139	KEKESI Marton	1995	HUN
	69	150743	BERNDT Ondrej	1988	CZE
	2	510890	ZURBRIGGEN Silvan	1981	SUI
Did not finish 1st run
	79	30283	FREEMAN CRESPO Ignacio	1992	ARG
	65	670058	KOSHKIN Dmitriy	1986	KAZ
	60	20324	OLIVERAS Marc	1991	AND
	59	910003	LINDNER Georg	1983	MDA
	54	410364	FEASEY Willis	1992	NZL
	48	400237	MEINERS Maarten	1992	NED
	47	491129	TERRA Ferran	1987	SPA
	42	400281	VAN HEEK Marvin	1991	NED
	41	400016	WANDERS Arjan	1978	NED
	40	481054	MURAVYEV Ivan	1989	RUS
	34	481705	GLEBOV Alexander	1983	RUS
	18	421483	JANSRUD Kjetil	1985	NOR
	5	530939	WEIBRECHT Andrew	1986	USA

18/01 Men's Super-Combined - Wengen

The long weekend in Wengen opens with a Super-Combined event, which is made by a downhill and only one run of slalom.
After the downhill the start list of the slalom is made from dh top 30 reversed (first start 30th placed of the dh, then 29th... down to 1st placed, after this also athletes out of top30 take the start, a win from these is much unlikely to happen)
It's the first of only two Combined in this season's calendar, next one (last one) is next weekend in Kitzbuhel.
Only one run of slalom makes those who prefer downhill big favored anyway...

h2h Svindal - Ligety - pick Ligety 1 unit @3.28 Lost -1
Big opportunity for Svindal to get some important points for the World Cup as current leader Hirscher is not racing in this event.
Anyway Ligety can suffer little damages in the dowhill and take the start in the slalom with a good number (from 15-20 I think) and make a good run.
While Svindal, who's not a slolom specialist, will take the start with one of the last number and run on a ruined slope and to take care of scoring points he'll probably go down very carefully

h2h Marsaglia - Innerhoffer - pick Marsaglia 1 unit @3.01 Lost -1
Small stake on the young Marsaglia, who's started his career as specialist of the combined.
Recently he's focused more on speed events like Downhill and Super-G reducing the gap between him and Innerhoffer.

h2h Raich - Jansrud - pick Raich 2 units @2.62 Won +3.24
Too bad odds are much more high now.
Anyway I think Combined is the only event where Raich can hope in some big results. He hardly finishes out of the top 10.
Jansrud is a great downhiller but lacks in slalom, I hope he'll use this event like an additional training for the true Dowhill race of saturday

h2h Innerhofer - Theaux - pick Innerhofer 2 units @1.75 Won +1.5
Odd is right, tough head to head, I prefer Innerhofer that maybe overall is better in both downhill and slalom.

h2h Jansrud - Pinturault - pick Pinturault 3 units @1.70 Won +2.1
Pinturault it's the best slalom specialist racing this one.
He's also decent enough in speed disciplines, and I think his team is working on him to make him compete for the Cup in the future, so combined is a good starting point and test to see his attitudes.

h2h Paris - Puchner - pick Paris 2 units @1.62 Won +1.24
I don't know how's Puchner in slalom, I think not good like most of downhill racer.
Paris is quite good in Combined, great in downhill and decent enough in slalom

+6.08
Bit lucky for Jansrud lost a ski while he was doing a good slalom run, he was close to beat Raich.
Decent Slalom also from Paris.
Very bad Svindal who's lost the little slalol-skills he had years ago.
Pinturault is too strong in slalom also for Kostelic by now.