“I admit, today I really would have liked to win”, said the leader after the first run and winner of the training but eventually ranked third, Gernot Schwab who had been last winter´s eternal runner up and was more than ready for his first win. A flaw in the first curve of the second run ruined his chances to win today´s race but after all he achieved Austria´s first and only podium finish of the current winter. “My personal resume looks worse than it is, I really liked last year´s tracks but those of this winter did not support my racing style. But we also made mistakes, we completely misjudged the material development in Italy and suddenly the Italians were unreachably ahead of us,” Schwab said. “The podium finish was extremely important for me, looking ahead into next winter. One day I will be ready to win”, he went on.
Ready to win was Martin Psenner (ITA). For the first time in his single seater career he gave an equally good performance in both runs and finished on top of the podium. Not a completely new feeling for the Italian. In his early days he was competing as a double seater and celebrated four World Cup wins between 1994 and 1998. “I did not waste one thought about the Overall World Cup, I concentrated on the race and took full risk”, said Psenner, who works as a mechanic and spends his entire annual vacation to follow his passion sledding.

Only by four hundredths of a second World Champion and Overall World cup winner Anton Blasbichler (ITA) missed his fifth win of the season. Ranked only fifth after the first run he was the fastest in the second run and eventually finished second. He had been the designated World Cup winner before the race, so he took it easy and was happy for his Italian fellow Psenner: “I am really glad that it finally worked out for him. He had a lot of bad luck last season, was sick during the World Championships and now the season took a great end for him, too.” And he added with a smile: “And today the Austrians had their success, too, so everybody is happy.”