Australia’s alpine racers Craig Branch and Jono Brauer are back in action on Friday (Vancouver time) in the super-G, each hoping to go a few spots better than the Downhill last Monday.

Branch finished 34th and Brauer 39th in the longest, straightest, fastest of the alpine events, and loved their experience of the challenging Dave Murray course at Whistler Creekside.

This time they will compete in the newest of the Olympic alpine events, the super-G (or super-Giant slalom), which combines speeds approaching those reached in the downhill with the more precise turns of the giant slalom, meaning competitors have to work hard all the way, with few gliding sections.

The challenging nature of the event is heightened by the fact that skiers aren’t allowed to train on the course and are allowed only a one-hour visual inspection on the morning of the race.

“I try to keep it as simple as I can,” Brauer said, by way of explaining what he takes form the course inspection. “I just look for the major changes in the course, the direction, blind rolls, that sort of stuff, and pretty much just focus on a section at a time, and make sure I know exactly where I’m going at the beginning of that and then it’s just following the rhythm into the next change.”

Both Aussies expect most of the top finishers in the downhill to figure in the top 10 again, so look out for Swiss downhill gold medallist Didier Defago, the Norwegian silver medallist Aksel Lund Svindal and American Bode Miller, who took the bronze, as well as reigning world champion Didier Cuche, Austrians Michael Walchhofer (10th in the downhill) and Benjamin Raich and Manuel Osborne-Paradis of Canada to be in contention.

“There’s definitely a lot of downhill contenders who ski super-G – you’re generally a speed or a technical skier - so a lot of downhill skiers move into super-G and do very well,” Brauer said, “but having said that, some technical skiers like Ted Ligety are making the crossover and skiing super fast, so there’s a few guys that we didn’t see in the downhill.”

The Thredbo-based 28-year-old, who switched from slalom a couple of years ago, says super-G is his current preference.

“I definitely have had a lot more training in super-G this season and it’s been going pretty well. After my switch to the speed disciplines at the beginning of last year, the super-G has gone a little more in my favour. “

Branch says he has appreciated the three-day break following the rescheduling of the downhill and some of the other alpine races.

 “Usually if we’re going to race downhill and super-G, they’re on consecutive days, so here we’ve had a bit of down time. That’s given us a chance to relax a bit and recover from the downhill, although we’ve kept on the skis to keep the feeling going,” the triple-Olympian said.

“I’ve done a couple of runs a day just to keep the time ticking over and keep the feeling of the skis.”

The 33-year-old from Sydney says the course is just as bumpy, if not bumpier, than it was for the downhill.

“It’s not a terribly steep hill, so there are some wide open sections. The course was already set as we came down from having our ski (on Thursday morning) so I had a quick look at the bottom section and it looked quite open and not much different from the downhill in some sections.

“Sometimes super-G can be more fun to ski, sometimes it flows better with the hill, and this is a good course. I skied it two years ago (in world cup) and it was a really fun course,” Branch added.

Murray Brust
AOC/Whistler