Yanqing (China) (AFP) - Alexis Pinturault's bid for an elusive Olympic gold took a hit after a "disappointing" downhill section of the Beijing 2022 men's alpine combined on Wednesday.
The French favourite, who won silver in Pyeongchang in 2018 behind now-retired Austrian Marcel Hirscher, clocked 1min 45.04sec down the 3.1-kilometre-long "Rock" course in brilliant sunshine and freezing conditions.
A mistake cost Pinturault valuable hundredths of a second and he will now tackle the slalom, scheduled for 2:15 pm (0615 GMT), with ground to make up on his main rivals.
"I didn't think that would have cost me so much, but the truth is that it has," bemoaned Pinturault.
"I'm quite behind, not on level pegging with (Johannes) Strolz and Marco (Schwarz), so all of a sudden it's far from obvious.
"But you never know what can happen.It can quickly swing the other way in the slalom," Pinturault said."The gap is big, but everything's possible."
Super-G bronze medallist Aleksander Aamodt Kilde topped the times with 1:43.12, but the Norwegian will likely lose any advantage he may have in the technical event and even admitted he'd struggle to make the podium.
"I don’t think so!" he said when asked whether he could push for another medal in these Games."But slalom is slalom, anything can happen.
"It’s a challenging slalom more because of the snow than the course.The course looks pretty nice.
"I haven’t skied slalom in two years, so for me it doesn’t really matter what comes, it’s going to be challenging anyways."
Kilde said his American girlfriend Mikaela Shiffrin, who has had a disastrous start to the Games after sliding out of her favoured slalom and giant slalom events, had offered him some advice.
"She just said to me ‘keep up the tempo and keep the skis under you’ and that’s what I’m going to do," the 29-year-old said.
While the more speed-inclined racers like Kilde may suffer on the slalom, it will instead likely be the Austrian pairing of reigning world champion Schwarz and Strolz who vie for gold.
Strolz was in fourth, at 0.75sec, and Schwarz was in fifth, 0.95sec behind the leader, both in prime position for the slalom at the National Alpine Skiing Centre in Yanqing.
It would be a remarkable comeback for Strolz, who was kicked off the Austrian team last year after a string of poor results but has fought back for an Olympic place after working for a time as a traffic policeman.
Strolz, whose father Hubert won combined gold in the 1988 Games, still prepares his own skis and this season had a breakthrough victory in the Swiss resort of Adelboden despite starting with the lowly bib number of 38 normally worn by rank outsiders.
The alpine combined, although shelved on the World Cup circuit, is the oldest alpine event, invented in the Swiss resort of Wengen in 1932 and adopted for the Olympics four years later.
It remains the ultimate challenge for all-round skiers, but has proven tough to host on the World Cup, notably with technical and speed skiers become even more specialised.
