(Reuters) – France’s Tessa Worley denied Mikaela Shiffrin a 13th Alpine skiing crystal globe when she won the giant slalom World Cup title in the last race of the season in Meribel, France on Sunday.
American Shiffrin, who had already secured the overall World Cup title, was trailing Sweden’s Sara Hector by 51 points and Worley by 46, but a dazzling first run put her on course for her second career giant slalom globe after her 2019 title.
Shiffrin led after the opening run as Hector only managed the 13th best time while Worley was eighth but the American, who had an Olympics to forget in Beijing last month, cracked in the second leg.
Worley skied a superb run and led with seven skiers to go, but still needing to finish at least third to deny Shiffrin the title in case the American ended up first.
Italy’s Marta Bassino, Slovak Petra Vlhova and Italian Federica Brignone did better than Worley, meaning a Shiffrin victory would mean she topped the season’s rankings.
With a 0.82-second lead over Brignone going into the second leg, Shiffrin made a cautious start and was behind the Italian at the halfway mark.
She finished 0.67 seconds off the pace and her seventh place meant Worley took the title despite her fourth place on the day.
Brignone won the race with a combined time of two minutes 14.68 seconds, 0.31 seconds ahead of Bassino with Vlhova third.
Worley has 567 points to Hector’s 540 and Shiffrin’s 507.
(Reporting by Julien Pretot; Editing by Ed Osmond)
