Green light!

Manuel Feller smiles for Christmas

Manuel Feller came seventh in the slalom in Alta Badia.(Bild: GEPA)

There were no presents for Ski Austria at the end of the Dolomites Tour - but Manuel Feller was happy about a ray of hope.

Austria's men's team is baking smaller rolls in the winter of the home World Championships. After the many disappointments at the "mini World Championships" in the Dolomites, there was a small ray of hope at the slalom in Alta Badia on Monday. Even if yesterday's seventh place would have been the Tyrolean's worst slalom result in the last crystal season.

Manuel Feller(Bild: GEPA pictures)

"Green light was important to me"
But Manu himself was also all smiles at the finish. And he clearly enjoyed sitting in the leader's red chair for the first time this season. "The green light was important to me," admitted Feller, "I've had a difficult few weeks. Out twice in the slalom, catastrophic in the giant slalom, and then a stone kept getting in my way. No, that did me some good."

Manuel Feller lit the fourth Advent candle.(Bild: Christof Birbaumer)

But it wasn't more than a ray of hope: "The upper part of the second run wasn't satisfactory. I really struggled to push."

"We're missing the final liberating element"
His teammates felt the same way. But both Michael Matt (16th) and Johannes Strolz (19th) saw progress in the difficult pre-Christmas period for the Austrians. "We're lacking that final liberating touch," nodded Strolz, "it's noticeable that we can't deliver the performances across the board that we should be able to."

They now want to work on this after Christmas. The results of the four Dolomite races were sobering for the ÖSV: no podium, two top 10 places. Stefan Eichberger 6th in the Val Gardena/Gröden Downhill, Feller 7th yesterday.

Timon Haugan snatched victory.(Bild: GEPA)

The most intensive technical phase of the ski winter now begins with the slalom in Madonna on January 8th. And that's when the Austrians want to give the Norwegians a run for their money. With Timon Haugan's success yesterday, the Vikings celebrated their third triumph of the season and the 200th Norwegian men's victory in the World Cup. The injured Marcel Hirscher was also delighted, Haugan is skiing his skis.