Naeslund and Tchiknavorian victorious in Val Thorens

“It was not the greatest visibility today, but I think it was fine and it was definitely fun racing. I am really happy with my win, I literally couldn’t ask for more, this is great,” World Cup leader Sandra Naeslund commented in the finish.

Thiknavorian takes maiden victory

Also on the men’s side, a French duo made it into the big final, that being Terence Tchiknavorian and Bastien Midol, joined by German athlete Florian Wilmsmann and Switzerland’s Joos Berry.

The men started out of the gate and were a pretty close pack but still Tchiknavorian managed to get into first position and his teammate Midol was super close behind him, making sure that he can use the draft of his frontman.

Wilmsmann and Berry were sitting in third and fourth position but battling really hard to not be in last position. At one point the tall German was able to win enough speed to get a good margin from his Swiss competitior.

Meanwhile in front of the heat, Tchiknavorian did some very clean skiing also into the negative turn, but through the final section of the course, Midol got closer and closer to his team mate and it looked as if both Frenchmen had made it through the finish line at the exact same moment.

This, of course called for a photo finish, which showed that it was super tight, but in the end, Terence Tchiknavorian claimed his first-ever victory oh his home soil, causing the crowd in the finish to go absolutely wild.