The China Mail - World Cup ski races cancelled because of bad weather

It is the seventh men's event to be cancelled this season out of nine scheduled.

Marco Odermatt won Saturday's giant slalom before bad weather closed in to wipe out the slalom.

"The snow was really good yesterday during the GS and then late afternoon it starts raining," said men's chief race director Markus Waldner.

"And then it turns into wet snow, strong wind also. We went out at two o'clock in the morning. The base was actually gone, not good enough to race anymore.

"We tried to set the course and clean a little bit, but it was not safe enough."

Prior to Saturday's giant slalom, the only other race to go ahead was a slalom in Gurgl, Austria.

The season giant slalom opener in neighbouring Soelden was cancelled, before two downhills in Zermatt-Cervinia (Switzerland/Italy) were also scratched.

Last weekend's races at the American resort of Beaver Creek -- two downhills and a super-G -- were wiped out by heavy snowfall and high winds.

- Snow in St Moritz -

After two days of speed racing in St Moritz, heavy snowfall on Saturday night made the Corviglia course unsafe for the women's super-G.

"It was quite a lot of snow last night," said Peter Gerdol, FIS race director for women.

"The minimum was 20 centimetres, there were some spots where it was over 40.

"The snow covered the whole course and the race line that we kept quite clean until last night. This new snow destroyed the base.

"It's impossible to get this base hard enough to make a safe race."

This event was to be the first women's speed race this season, since the two downhills at Cervinia-Zermatt in mid-November also fell victim to the weather.

Sofia Goggia won the first super-G in St Moritz on Friday in light snow and poor visibility, while Mikaela Shiffrin won the downhill on Saturday, her 91st World Cup victory, under sparkling skies.

The American leads the overall women's standings, 195 points ahead of the Italian Federica Brignone while Marco Schwartz leads fellow-Austrian Manuel Feller by 36 points in the men's.

The women will try again next weekend in Val d'Isère, also in speed, with a downhill and a super-G while the men resume on Friday with four consecutive days of racing in Val Gardena and Alta Badia in the Italian Dolomites.

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E.Choi--ThChM