The first race is done: 11th place and a second behind – you can’t be happy with that. I didn’t feel comfortable at all on the snow in Levi. In training the slope was still nice and hard, but in the race it softened up.

I had the feeling the snow was actually slowing my turns down rather than speeding them up. Nothing happened on the flat section either. In Levi they use stored snow (snow from the previous year), artificial snow and fresh snow on top. That creates conditions that are a bit of a lottery. But we’re on the right track – the second run was already an improvement. Somehow, almost by tradition, we as a team haven’t had much success in Levi. So you shouldn’t read too much into that race, and the coaches see it the same way.

The next race in Val d’Isère is a completely different story. In recent years I’ve always been among the fastest in Val d’Isère, so I’m expecting a lot. My absolute favourite courses then all come in January – they’re simply awesome. Speaking of awesome: many thanks to the Arlberger Bergbahnen, who made it possible for me to prepare perfectly for Val d’Isère in St. Anton. So now it’s lots of training and fine-tuning. Apart from a few days of giant slalom training, the focus is fully on the slalom in the French Alps.
So: here we go!