ALPINE:

Vonn fastest, Janyk 17th in final Zauchensee training

Jan. 7, 2011 

ALTENMARKT-ZAUCHENSEE, Austria — American Lindsey Vonn posted the fastest time in the final downhill training Friday ahead of this weekend's World Cup speed races.

The defending overall champion finished the 3-kilometer Kaelberloch course in 1 minute, 46.86 seconds to beat Sweden's Anja Paerson by 0.40.

"It's just a training run so it doesn't say anything about the race," Vonn said. "I am glad that I found the right line for most of the course."

Nicole Schmidhofer of Austria was 0.72 back in third, while teammate Anna Fenninger, who had the best time in the first training run on Thursday, took fourth, another 0.01 behind.

Germany's Maria Riesch, who leads Vonn by 833 to 647 points in the overall standings, missed a gate and finished 1.61 seconds behind.

Britt Janyk of Canada was 17th, with Georgia Simmerling 45th.

"I tried some different things so it's good to know now they won't work for the race," Riesch said. "There are a lot of narrow turns so you must stay on the right line to be able to really charge."

Riesch scored heavily in the technical disciplines the last couple of weeks. And with two more slaloms and a giant slalom coming up after this weekend, Vonn knows she has to rack up as many points as possible.

"Every race is a chance to get closer to Maria," the American three-time champion said. "However, being behind doesn't put me under extra pressure. Basically, I am always under pressure."

Paerson, who holds 41 career World Cup titles but hasn't been on a podium this season, was pleased with her second-fastest time. The Swede seemed to have rediscovered her form and confidence after equipment troubles spoiled the first part of her season.

"I was skiing really well but my material wasn't good," Paerson said. "Suddenly, nothing worked. So we made some small changes, and as they didn't work, I changed my setup drastically. I feel much better now."

The weekend races consist of a downhill on Saturday and a super-G the next day.  S-Magazine

— The Canadian Press contributed to this report

Altenmarkt-Zauchense women's World Cup downhill training No. 2 results