Corey Peters (Wānaka) has won the FIS Para Alpine Downhill World Cup in Italy overnight, backing up his silver medal performance from yesterday at the high-speed double-header World Cup event. This result marks Peters’ third Downhill World Cup win, his sixth Downhill World Cup podium and his incredible 21st World Cup podium of his decorated career.
Peters explained; “It feels absolutely amazing. All the hard work and dedication from myself and the rest of the team is paying off. These wins certainly don't come easy, so I’m just really stoked. Conditions weren't the greatest for Downhill with snow and rain making visibility and snowpack far from ideal, but I had a good plan tactically and mentally and stuck to the process.”
Conditions on course were challenging today, and varied from yesterday, requiring a different approach from Peters’ and his team. Snow overnight meant extensive course slipping, and even the use of a groomer on a section of the course was required to get the slope race ready. Due to the length of a Downhill course, the snow surface changed from the top of the course where it was colder to the bottom of course where the warmer conditions resulted in the snow being soft and peely.
Once again, we saw a tightly fought race today, with just three-hundredths of a season separating Peters from Dutch skier Jeroen Kamperschreur who finished in second place. Andrew Kurka of the USA rounded out the podium in third.
Peters said, “These World Cup wins are getting harder every year I compete; it's just such small margins between the competition. My confidence is growing but I'll continue to take it one day at a time and not get ahead of myself. The season has just begun so there's still a lot of racing between now and Cortina.
It was a team effort today, with Snow Sports NZ Lead Alpine Para Coach Daniel Bogue crediting the success to Peters’ solid plan to manage the conditions and the efforts from their wax technician who helped Peters maximised the available speed on course.
Peters is the Beijing 2022 Paralympic Winter Games Champion in this discipline, and this double-header event marks his return to the Downhill start gate as he prepares for his fourth Paralympics in Milano Cortina in March next year.
3 days ago