"Krone" stoplight

Like Rudi in 1991

"Krone" head of sport Peter Moizi writes about Raphael Haaser's World Championship triumph in his column.(Bild: Krone KREATIV/Christof Birbaumer / Kronen Zeitung)

"Oh, how beautiful it is", sang the fans in the finish area, the DJ switched between "On Days Like These", the Danube Waltz and "We Are the Champions". Almost 20,000 ski fans went crazy. Tears of emotion during the national anthem, an exuberant champagne shower. Saalbach experienced an incomparable gold party well into the night.

Raphael Haaser wrote red-white-red skiing history. The Tyrolean was the last man to make the team, he has never finished in the top 5 in this discipline in the World Cup, no giant slalom world champion has ever had a higher starting number than Haaser with 22. "When it's good, it's good," commented the 27-year-old dryly. A sentence that made Rudi Nierlich famous. The Upper Austrian won gold in the giant slalom at the 1991 World Championships in Saalbach, but unfortunately died in a traffic accident three months later. From the first impression, the two have some parallels. Similar types, self-promoters look different. Haaser is calm, appears balanced and is authentic, only when he kissed his girlfriend Fabiana Dorigo in victory did his emotions get the better of him.

With gold and silver, Raphael steals the show from Marco Odermatt, Austria celebrates a new ski star who has experienced the most exciting weeks of his career since his second place in Kitzbühel. All the more astonishing when you consider that Haaser had not had a single day of skiing for six weeks before that due to injury.