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After the last podium 3 years ago in Garmisch, in the last 25 giants between CdM, Olympics and World Championships, the American champion collected a 5th place as the best result. The double non-qualification in the two races in Adelboden was perhaps the lowest point of his entire career, but the fifth participation in the Games is too great an incentive to stop now.
Friday 15 January 2021 5 minutes reading time
Many enthusiasts will have definitely hurt to see his skiing, with a style that remains unmistakable, increasingly slow in movement and, it has been clear for some time now, unsuitable for modern skiing.
What is certain is that the lack of qualification for the 2nd heat both in the first giant of Adelboden, last Friday, and in the encore 24 hours later, is too much for a champion like Ted Ligety; the difficulties of the three-time world champion in specialty are even more evident in this first part of a season that saw him finish 22nd in the WCSL, with 17 points collected in six races between a 19th place in the first giant of Santa Caterina Valfurva and a 26th in Alta Badia.
For someone who has achieved 24 of his 25 World Cup victories between the wide gates, even if the last success dates back to over 5 years ago in Soelden, one cannot but think about the fact that the 36-year-old native of Utah is living a last phase of the career too far from the levels that such an athlete must at least approach. Ligety spoke clearly last summer: "I want to continue until Beijing 2022, I still feel competitive". The goal of the fifth participation in the Olympic Games, where he won gold in combined in Turin 2006 and the most precious metal in giant in Sochi 2014, is clearly very strong and the choice to devote himself only to his favorite discipline went to optics to regain the necessary competitiveness to get closer to the podium.
This has not been the case so far, even if in the past season there have been some calls, with 5th place at the start in Soelden and 7th in Adelboden. Then it got worse and worse and the numbers, objectively, are merciless: "Mr. GS "has not been on the podium since January 28, 2018, third in the Garmisch-Partenkirchen giant dominated by Marcel Hirscher, while the previous top 3 in the cup dates back to December 2015, second in super-g in" his "Beaver Creek (on the day of first and only victory of Hirscher himself in speed), a month and a half before injuring his cruciate and suffering, in January 2017, another delicate operation for a herniated disc (skipping the World Championships in Sankt Moritz), two long stops which undeniably conditioned the last years of his long adventure in the white circus.
From the podium in Garmisch to the two races in Adelboden, between the CdM, the Olympics and the World Championships, Ligety played another 25 giants, obtaining that 5th place in Soelden, which we were talking about previously, as a top result (together with the same placement in the Alpine combined PyeongChang Games). If he can let us review at least some high quality and pure class heats, they would all be really happy, apart from the results.
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