Fall dashes skier’s hopes

Press, 18 March 1986, Page 24

Fall dashes skier’s hopes

NZPA-Reuter

Whistler Mountain, British Columbia A heartbreaking fall only 200 metres from the finish cost the Swiss, Peter Mueller, a chance to tie for the men's Alpine

ski-ing World Cup downhill title, at the week-end. Mueller suffered his despair during the last event in the discipline, leaving Anton Steiner as the race winner and his fellow Austrian Peter

Wimsberger at the top of the final downhill standings. Wirnsberger, who was already assured of at least a share of the title, took the crown for the first time with 120 points — five ahead of Mueller.

Steiner surged down the treacherous, ice-coated Whistler Mountain piste, with its 44 gates and 989metre vertical drop, in 2min 9.785. He edged Michael Mair of Italy by 11 hundredths of a second, while Leonard Stock of Austria was third in 2:10.14. Steiner was in the finish area when Mueller, running nearly a second faster, lost his balance and fell coming off Franz’s Hopp.

“I took a risk coming over the last jump,” said Mueller, who had won three of the last four races.

“I could stand up and push this jump, but I took a risk and the course was too fast and I had no chance to make it. The skis came up and I landed on my tails.” Wirnsberger, who started two places ahead of Mueller and finished eleventh in 2:11.63, was the first to console Mueller in the finish area.

“It was really bad luck for him,” said Wirnsberger, who won four consecutive races earlier in the season. "He fell so close to the finish line and he was really close to winning it.