St. Anton (AUT)
January 11th Downhill / Women 11:15 CET
January 12th Super-G / Women 11:15 CET
On the second weekend of January, the world’s fastest women skiers will once again gather on St. Anton to race in the challenging “Karl Schranz” racecourse. The 2025 program in St. Anton includes one Downhill and one Super-G.
St. Anton is located in the Austrian state of Tyrol, in the valley of the Rosanna River, at the westernmost tip of Austria near the border with Switzerland.
In 1927, winter sports pioneer Sir Arnold Lunn came to St. Anton where he met the legendary Hannes Schneider. Together with Schneider, Lunn decided to organize a new Alpine competition in St. Anton in the year 1928. It involved a Downhill and a Slalom race, with the outcome determined by combining the competitor’s times for the two races in a single result. Sir Arnold Lunn is credited with creating Alpine ski racing and St. Anton was where he did it.
The Kandahar Race takes its name from the Roberts of Kandahar Challenge Cup, a ski race first held in Crans-Montana for a trophy donated by Field Marshal Earl Frederick Sleigh Roberts of Kandahar. The first race organized by Arnold Lunn took place in Crans-Montana, Switzerland, in 1911.
The First Arlberg Kandahar Race was held in St. Anton in Galzig Mountain on March 3rd and 4th, 1928.
The races are named after the two original organizers of the race, the Ski-Club Arlberg in Austria and the British Kandahar Ski Club in Mürren, Switzerland.
Founded in 1901, the Arlberg Ski Club is the first Austrian winter sports club and one of the oldest in the world.
In 1929 and 1930, the Arlberg-Kandahar Race was held in St. Anton. From 1931, the races were alternately held at St. Anton and Mürren. In 1948, Chamonix, France, became the third host, followed by Sestrière, Italy, in 1951 and Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany in 1954. Until the introduction of the World Cup in 1967, the Kandahar races were the most important Alpine ski races besides the Winter Olympics and the World Championships
St. Anton was also the venue for the Alpine Ski World Championships in 2001, an event that marked the process of modernization of the ski resort and a series of improvements in the destination that made the experience for visitors significantly improved.
A process that has continued in recent years. The 2016-2017 season marked a turning point in Arlberg's history with the creation of the largest interconnected ski area in Austria and one of the five largest ski domains in the world: the Ski Arlberg.
Racecourse facts:
Start Elevation: 2023 m (DH) / 1940 m (SG)
Finish Elevation: 1342 m (DH-SG)
Vertical Drop: 681 m (DH) / 598 (SG)
Distance: 2068 m (DH) / 1735 (SG)
Average slope: 35%
Maximum slope: 88%
Sofia Goggia won the last women's Downhill Alpine Ski World Cup race to be staged at St. Anton am Arlberg on 9 January 2021. Then aged 28, she was the oldest skier to triumph in this race at the venue.
Goggia can become the first women's skier to win multiple World Cup Downhill races in St. Anton am Arlberg.
In 2021 Sofia Goggia’s high-risk skiing was rewarded with a dominating win in a St. Anton Women's Downhill.
Coming down with bib number 5, Goggia attacked the Karl Schranz racecourse and left no doubt that her time of 1:24:06 would withstand anyone’s chance to take the victory. Austrian Tamara Tippler came in second place +0.96 off the top mark. Breezy Johnson finished in third place +1.04 behind Goggia.
Before Goggia, two US skiers won the Downhill in St. Anton: Lindsey Vonn in 2007, and Alice McKennis in 2013.
In December 1995, Michaela Dorfmeister became the last Austrian to win a World Cup Downhill race in St Anton.
Federica Brignone won the first of the two Super-G races held in St. Anton. In a shortened racecourse, Brignone mastered the difficult conditions with a risky and technically clean ride, especially in the last section. Joana Hählen finished in second place 0.54 seconds behind Brignone. Lara Gut-Behrami was third 0.66 seconds behind the Italian.
In 2023 Lara Gut-Behrami won the last Women's Super-G held in St Anton am Arlberg. After finishing the day before on the podium in third place, Gut-Behrami won the second Super-G held in St. Anton ahead of a trio of Italians. The winner of the first Super-G Federica Brignone finished in second place 0.15 seconds behind. Marta Bassino was third (+0.19) and Elena Curtoni fourth (+0.52).
Lara Gut-Behrami celebrated her second victory in the Super-G in St. Anton. She won the race in 2021.
St Anton has hosted five World Cup super-G races, and the Austrian team has never won. Anna Feninger finished second behind Tina Maze in 2013. Previously, in 1999, in the first World Cup Super-G race in the cradle of skiing, Alexandra Meissnitzer and Michaela Dorfmeister finished second and third respectively behind the winner, Swiss skier Corinne Rey Bellet.
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