Vatra Dornei (ck) - She has won 11 consecutive races, she secured the tenth career win in the overall world cup after only five season races, yet top star Ekatharina Lavrentjeva (RUS) does not think about records. Her focus is on the track. “I always think about the run and the track, from start to finish, and I try to stay focused. I always want to have a good run, winning is only the result. Records are not my main goal”, says the Russian who leads all eternal record lists anyway, and will for a while. So the excitement is big among her competitors when one of them manages to come close to her, like it was the case in the first run when Evelin Lanthaler was only 0.12 seconds behind Lavrentjeva and eventually finished second. “Congratulations to Evelin”, said Greta Pinggera (ITA), who finished third. “It does not happen too often that one of us gets that close to Kathi.” In the Italian duel this time Evelin Lanthaler was the luckier one and took place one behind Lavrentjeva. “My goal is the second place in the overall ranking and I am 10 points ahead now, I will try to defend this”, said Lanthaler who likes the new track better and better. “I have had only four runs here, so I am quite satisfied”. Not so satisfied was Greta Pinggera: “With three podium finishes in my first world cup season I can be more than satisfied, but my run times here are not good enough yet”, she said. Constantly improving is Petra Dragicevic from Slovenia who finished seventh and colored the result list: now there were five different nations among the top seven women. In the men’s event Patrick Pigneter (ITA) snatched back his leading position in the overall world cup after winning the race with two fastest run times, but he was not overly confident before the race: “I was worried because we had similar soft track conditions in Kindberg where I was far behind without any mistakes and I used the exact same equipment today. But today it worked perfectly well.” His toughest opponent in the world cup, Hannes Clara (ITA) crashed in the finished area in the first run and ranked only seventh after the first run, had to be satisfied with a happy end as he came in fourth in the final ranking. “I had a huge mistake in the fifth curve and then I tried to take full risk and make up for it, but it had a bad end in the finished as I crashed into the boards. But I could catch up a bit in the second run and I am totally satisfied. In the last race I will fully attack once again as I know, anything is possible here.” Surprisingly, Austria’s Michael Scheikl and Dominik Holzknecht took the places two and three. Scheikl was surprised himself about his good result: “I never really felt at home on this track, my times were ok, but I saw myself somewhere around the fifth place with everybody being so close together. It is amazing that on such a long and wide track where you almost can get lost, the times are so close. But of course I am happy about my result, I never would have expected this.” Dominik Holzknecht on the contrary, almost announced his top form through his training results and the podium finish in the doubles’ event. “I really like the track here and I have nothing to lose, I can only win and I can fully attack”, said the junior who competed for the second time in a world cup race and finished third. That he might lose his role as the hunter and be the hunted soon, doesn’t bother him: “In this league you have to be able to handle this. I will try to make the best out of it.” In the Nations’ Cup Anton Blasbichler headed the Italian clean sweep with Rudi Resch on second and Florian Breitenberger on third place. Overall 16 athletes took part in this race which has been the biggest entry field of this season. Russia won the team event with Ekatharina Lavrentjeva and Aleksandr Egorov/Petr Popov being the fastest within their categories. Michael Scheikl (AUT) claimed the best time in the men’s race which put Austria on the second spot ahead of Italy. Final Results Women: 1. Ekatharina LAVRENTJEVA (RUS), 1:14,45(1), 1:12,91(1), 2:27,36 2. Evelin LANTHALER (ITA), 1:14,57(2), 1:13,43(2), 2:28,00 3. Greta PINGGERA (ITA), 1:15,78(3), 1:14,95(3), 2:30,73 4. Tina UNTERBERGER (AUT), 1:16,39(4), 1:14,95(3), 2:31,34 5. Veronika NACHMANN (GER), 1:16,53(5), 1:15,82(6), 2:32,35 6. Liudmila AKSENENKO (RUS), 1:16,84(6), 1:16,81(8), 2:33,65 7. Petra DRAGICEVIC (SLO), 1:17,84(8), 1:16,60(7), 2:34,44 8. Maria AUER (AUT), 1:17,77(7), 1:18,63(12), 2:36,40 Final Results Men: 1. Patrick PIGNETER (ITA), 1:10,72(1), 1:12,97(1), 2:23,69 2. Michael SCHEIKL (AUT), 1:11,52(2), 1:13,59(2), 2:25,11 3. Dominik HOLZKNECHT (AUT), 1:11,84(4), 1:13,59(2), 2:25,43 4. Hannes CLARA (ITA), 1:11,90(7), 1:13,65(4), 2:25,55 5. Florian CLARA (ITA), 1:11,89(6), 1:14,09(5), 2:25,98 6. Thomas KAMMERLANDER (AUT), 1:12,31(9), 1:14,28(6), 2:26,59 7. Jurii TALIKH (RUS), 1:12,25(8), 1:14,38(7), 2:26,63 8. Thomas SCHOPF (AUT), 1:11,76(3), 1:14,88(9), 2:26,64 Final Results Team Event (8): 1. RUSSIA Ekatharina LAVRENTJEVA (1), Jurii TALIKH (4), Alekrandr EGOROV/Petr POPOV(1) 3:52,80 2. AUSTRIA Tina UNTERBERGER (3), Michael SCHEIKL (1), Christian SCHOPF/Andreas SCHOPF (3) 3:54,97 3. ITALY Evelin LANTHALER (2), Hannes CLARA (2), Patrick PIGNETER/Florian CLARA (2) 3:55,04 4. GERMANY Veronika NACHMANN (4), Marcus GRAUSAM (5), Blörn KIERSPEL/Christian WICHAN (4), 4:00,56 5. POLAND Wioletta RYS (6), Adam JEDRZEJKO (6), Andrzej LASZCZAK/Damian WANICZEK (5), 4:03,75 World Cup Rankings (5/6): Men: 1. Patrick PIGNETER (ITA) 424 2. Hannes CLARA (ITA) 385 3. Thomas KAMMERLANDER (AUT) 350 4. Michael SCHEIKL (AUT) 306 5. Thomas SCHOPF (AUT) 297 6. Alex GRUBER (ITA) 220 7. Stanislav KOVSHIK (RUS) 197 8. Jurii TALIKH (RUS) 178 9. Adam JEDRZEJKO (POL) 172 10. Florian CLARA (ITA) 157 Women: 1. Ekatharina LAVRENTJEVA (RUS) 500 points 2. Evelin LANTHALER (ITA) 370 3. Greta PINGGERA (ITA) 360 4. Liudmila AKSENENKO (RUS) 272 5. Melanie SCHWARZ (ITA) 262 6. Tina UNTERBERGER (AUT) 237 7. Michaela MAURER (GER) 201 8. Veronika NACHMANN (GER) 196 9. Christina GOETSCHL (AUT) 194 10. Petra DRAGICEVIC (SLO) 178