Strong performance

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Elias Leitner is having an excellent debut season in the World Cup.(Bild: FIS/Miha Matavz)

This weekend, the snowboard cross World Cup is being held in the Georgian winter sports resort of Gudauri. Not taking part due to illness: Olympic champion Alessandro Hämmerle. Nevertheless, the man from Vorarlberg did not miss the opportunity to cheer on his teammates during the qualifying on Friday.

Olympic champion Alessandro "Izzi" Hämmerle would have loved to be at the start of the World Cup doubles in Gudauri (Geo) himself - but a bacterial infection knocked the Montafon native out. Nevertheless, the 31-year-old did not miss the opportunity to watch the qualifying for the first race on Saturday (11.30 CET) on the livestream from his couch at home on Friday.

Strong run with potential
He not only saw a clear best time from Cameron Bolton (Aus), who beat the rest of the field by over six tenths of a second, but also his young Skiclub Montafon colleague Elias Leitner, who achieved his best qualifying result to date in 20th place and thus secured his participation in the knockout heats in the first run. "That was a strong run," said the veteran, who was delighted with the newcomer, who is competing in his first full World Cup season this winter and has already scored points twice. "It was definitely a confirmation of his talents and I hope that the result will also give him a lot of confidence for the race."

Five Austrians in the race for victory
The 21-year-old will face Jake Vedder (US), Alvaro Romero (Sp) and Kurt Hoshino (D) in the round of 16. With World Champion Jakob Dusek (5th), Lukas Pachner (6th), David Pickl (21st) and Julian Lüftner (24th), four other ÖSV athletes will also be in the fight for victory on Saturday.