In his only fourth World Cup race he already made the top of the podium. The 21-year-old Italian, Mathias Rainer, gave a stunning performance and stopped serial winner and team mate Anton Blasbichler. “After my first place in the training I already thought that I could go for a top five result, but I never would have dared to think of winner. A dream of mine has become true today.” Before he went into his first World Cup season he had humble goals: “All I wanted was to compete in the World Cup and qualify as often as possible”. Which is a tough task anyway, considering the momentary strength of the Italian team. As if to prove this, Mathias Rainer did not qualify for the upcoming World Championships next week. “I missed the qualification by four hundredths of a second and I doubt that my winning here today will change anything”, he said.

Mathias Rainer was the best of five Italians at the top of the ranking. Third time runner up in this season was Florian Breitenberger. “I am satisfied with my season, if I am looking back. You need perfect material and you have to give 100%. This works out for me pretty well for the time being. Today´s race I lost in the finish curve, I made a mistake there and this was it,” said Breitenberger. After his victory (shared with Anton Blasbichler) at the beginning of the season Patrik Pigneter made a comeback on the podium. He finished third and sees the secret of the Italian success in the great climate within the team: “We are a great team, we get along well, we help each other and this is how we push each other.”

Martin Psenner finished fourth and missed the podium for the very first time in this season. Anton Blasbichler could not continue his winning streak, but a fifth rank was enough for him to win the Overall World Cup today already. He won the ranking for the fourth time in his career which no other athlete ever managed to do.

Best non-Italian ranked sixth was Austria´s Florian Batkowski, the reigning World Champion Robert´s younger brother.

The RED BULL World Cup will be finished in Olang (ITA), February 18th to 20th, after a four-week-break, which does not mean that the athletes will have time to relax. In only a couple of days the World Championships in Latsch (ITA) will be opened.

Photo: Bernhard Kogler