Mikaela Shiffrin has claimed her 70th career victory on Saturday when she prevailed in a thrilling giant slalom duel with Lara Gut-Behrami in the opening race of the alpine skiing World Cup season.
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American Shiffrin, who is the Olympic champion in the discipline, clocked a combined 2 minutes 7.22 seconds from two runs under sunny Austrian skies in Soelden on Saturday.
World champ Gut-Behrami led Shiffrin two two-hundredth after the first run, and by one-hundredth at the final split but the Swiss eventually had to settle for second, .14 off the pace.
Defending overall World Cup champ Petra Vlhova of Slovakia completed the podium as a distant third, 1.30 back, up from sixth after the first run.
Winning gave the three-time overall World Cup champ Shiffrin a perfect start into the season highlighted by the February 4-20 Beijing Olympics.
The men have their season-opening giant slalom at the same venue on Sunday.
Australian Associated Press