First Greek Alpine Skiing World Championship Medal
First Greek Alpine Skiing World Championship Medal
Published : 19-Feb-2023 02:31
Greek skier AJ Ginnis has become the first from his country to win an Alpine Ski World Championships medal in the 92-year history of the now bi-annual competition.
Ginnis was lying in second after the first run and held on to silver as Austria's Manu Feller, who was leading after the first run, ended up out of the medals.
Alexandros Ioannis Ginnis (28) was born and grew up in Athens skiing at Greece's leading ski area of Mt Parnassus but moved to the US aged 15 and was part of the US team at the 2017 Alpine World Ski Championships in St Moritz but was later dropped from the team after string of injuries and went to race for his birth nation. He had previously posted his best-ever result just over a year ago in the final race before the Beijing Olympics, taking second having never made a top 10 finish before.
In a rollercoaster final event of the 2022-23 Alpine World Ski Championships in Courchevel and Meribel, Norway's Henrik Kristofferson, who had been in 16th place after the first run, took gold as the 15 skiers starting after him failed to beat his combined two-run time.
Beyond the headline winners and losers the 2023 Alpine World Ski Championships some other noteworthy facts and stats were achieved.
Following their first women's World Cup win in almost five decades by Valérie Grenier in January, Canada took a record four medals including two golds with Laurence St. Germain winning the slalom and James Crawford the gold, placing them join third on the medal table with the US and Italy, behind Switzerland and Norway. Unusually Austria did not win any events.
The Championships were also unusual in that every race took place as scheduled over the two week period under clear skies without the problems that include rain or snowfall, gale force winds or too little snow that often impact race timings.
Meanwhile Mikaela Shiffrin, currently lying one-win behind the 86 World Cup wins total of Ingemar Stenmark, moved into top (or second) spot for all-time World Championships medals with two silvers and a gold at Courchevel Meribel. She had previously been tied with another Swedish great, from the same small ski hill as Stenmark, Anja Pärson, but her new total of 14 World Championship medals is now the most in the "modern era" and since World War II.
However, going back to the first Championships in the early 1930s, when they were staged annually although with only three events, Germany's Christl Cranz won 15 medals, 12 of them golds.
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