By Simon Jennings
YANQING, China (Reuters) – Austria’s Johannes Strolz is in prime position for his second gold medal of the Winter Olympics after finishing the first run of the men’s slalom in first place, two hundredths of a second ahead of Norway’s Henrik Kristoffersen.
Strolz, who won gold in the combined on Thursday, the same race his father Hubert won at the Calgary Games in 1988, was 0.06 seconds ahead of another Norwegian, Sebastian Foss-Solevaag, who finished third.
“It was a good first run,” Strolz said. “I’m surprised myself because the feeling wasn’t that great. I tried to attack and it paid off. There were a few pretty tight moments. I have to focus well on the second run.”
Swiss skier Loic Meillard was 0.30 seconds behind the leader in fourth after the top 30 racers finished their first runs down the ‘Ice River’ course.
The second run of the final men’s individual Alpine skiing event of the Games starts at 13:45 local time (0545 GMT).
Eight other racers were within a second of Strolz, with Germany’s Linus Strasser in fifth place, 0.33 seconds off the pace, followed by France’s Clement Noel, Austrian Michael Matt and Italy’s Tommaso Sala.
Bulgarian Albert Popov was also well placed, 0.70 seconds behind Strolz in ninth place, followed by the Russian Olympic Committee’s Alexander Khoroshilov, Switzerland’s Ramon Zenhaeusern and Italy’s Giuliano Razzoli.
Dave Ryding, the 35-year-old Briton who won the classic Kitzbuehel race, was 16th, 1.21 seconds behind the leader.
(Reporting by Simon Jennings, additional reporting by Shadia Nasralla and Simon Evans; Editing by Peter Rutherford)
