By Andrew Mitchell
Mont Tremblant’s Erik Guay followed up a pair of downhill medals in Germany with a silver medal at Kvitfjell, Norway, bringing his tally to four medals this season and the tally of the Canadian Alpine Ski Team to 13 — exceeding the team’s goals for the season, and tying the record earned by the team in 1982.
When including top-10 performances, however, the Canadian team now has 43 this season, up from 39 last year.
The men raced a downhill, super G and super combined in Norway March 9-11.
In the super combined, a combination of one super G run and one slalom run, Benjamin Raich of Austria took the gold, followed by Silvan Zurbriggen of Switzerland and Aksel Lund Svindal of Norway. Three Canadians finished in the top-30 — Ryan Semple was 23 rd , John Kucera 24 th , and Michael Janyk 27 th .
The downhill was the following day, with Guay continuing to turn heads with his all-or-nothing skiing.
“My week went pretty good,” he said. “I improved with each run leading up to the race. I am really satisfied with my run although I made some mistakes.
“(The Canadians are) definitely creating a buzz on the tour. People are talking about the Canadians everywhere we go.”
Didier Cuche of Switzerland took the gold, while Marco Buechel of Liechtenstein won bronze.
Jeffrey Frisch earned his best result of the season for the Canadian team, placing 12 th . John Kucera was 19 th .
In the super G, Francois Bourque was the top Canadian in 11 th place. John Kucera and Jan Hudec also cracked the top 30 in 15 th and 20 th place respectively.
While the men were racing in Norway, the women’s technical team was at Zwiesel, Germany. No podiums for Canada, but Genevieve Simard managed to pick up another top-10 result.
Tanja Poutainen of Finland took the gold, followed by Nicole Hosp and Machaela Kirchgasser of Austria. Simard of Val Morin, Quebec was the top Canadian in ninth place, just 0.8 seconds back of third place. Emily Brydon also completed two runs to place 22 nd .
In the slalom the next day — the weakest link for the women’s team this season — no Canadians competed.
Marlies Schild of Austria won the gold, Anna Ottosson of Sweden took silver, and Sarka Zahrobska of Czech Republic claimed third.
The World Cup finals take place this weekend at Lenzerheide, Switzerland, with the top-25 from each discipline racing to the secure their spots in the overall rankings.
Canada will send its strongest teams yet to the finals.
On the men’s side, Erik Guay is sitting third in downhill and 18 th in super G; John Kucera is second in super G, 18 th in giant slalom and 22 nd in combined; Francois Bourque is fifth in GS, 22 nd in super G and 23 rd in combined; Mike Janyk is eighth in slalom; Thomas Grandi is 17 th in slalom and 20 th in giant slalom; Kelly VanderBeek is sixth in downhill and seventh in super G; Emily Brydon is 13 th in downhill, 17 th in super G and 10 th in combined; Britt Janyk was 25 th in downhill and fifth in super G; and Genevieve Simard is 16 th in giant slalom and 23 rd in super G.
