Vincent Kriechmayr was the first to start the race after Peter Fill and Mauro Caviezel dropped out, and he put in a good run. Kjetil Jansrud, the top favorite, started seventh and convinced in the upper part with the long curves. He already took over half a second from Kriechmayr by the 2nd intermediate time and thus took the lead. His compatriot Aksel Lund Svindal came into the race shortly after, did not complete the upper part as well as Jansrud. The question was whether Svindal could still turn up the heat in the lower sections and take the fastest time. He reduced the gap until the 3rd intermediate time, but it was not quite enough. After a snowfall shortly after the final jump, he crossed the finish line 0.31 seconds behind Jansrud. To his surprise, Frenchman Blaise Giezendanner then skied faster than Svindal and got in between the two Norwegians who had been in the lead until then.
The trembling for the medals
After Kriechmayr and Reichelt, Max Franz entered the race as the third member of the Austrian team with number 13. But when it lit red at the 2nd intermediate time with 1.29 seconds behind, it was clear, for him the race was over. After that Adrien Theaux started. For the Frenchman it went a little better than in the downhill, but with rank 15 he remained far away from the set goals. Now it was Matthias Mayer's turn as the last Austrian and he skied very clean in the upper part. Even though he was not the fastest with 99 km/h, he lost only one tenth to Jansrud until the 2nd intermediate time and he did not ski the 3rd section perfectly. Mayer remained constant and skied as well in this giant slalom part as he did at the top and this gave him a 0.19 second lead over Jansrud at the 3rd intermediate time, which he was able to maintain until the finish and took the lead. Svindal was thus out of reach of the medals.
Now Beat Feuz, Dominik Paris and Christoph Innerhofer were still at the start as medal candidates with numbers 16, 17 and 18. Feuz started after Mayer and was able to keep up with Mayer and equalized the 2nd intermediate time, but then lost 0.31 seconds until the 3rd intermediate time, which meant that Jansrud would still remain second. However, with a strongly skied final section he moved ahead of Jansrud into second place overall, 0.13 seconds behind Mayer.
Dominik Paris was fast with 101 km/h and kept the gap within limits with 0.36 seconds until the intermediate time. A driving mistake, which he corrected with a balancing act, then cost him too much time to make it into the medal ranks. For Christoph Innerhofer it lit up green at the top. With 98 km/h, he was nevertheless a bit too slow and also lost time continuously afterwards and was far behind when he crossed the finish line.
After missing his chance in the downhill, Austria's Matthias Mayer took revenge with a flawless run and claimed his second gold medal at an Olympics after the downhill in Sochi in 2014.
Ranking list of the Super G from 16. 02.2018 (places 1-30)
Rank | Start number | Driver | Travel time |
1 | 15 | Matthias Mayer | 1:24.44 |
2 | 16 | Beat Feuz | 1:24.57 |
3 | 7 | Kjetil Jansrud | 1:24.62 |
4 | 10 | Blaise Giezendanner | 1:24.82 |
5 | 9 | Aksel Lund Svindal | 1:24:93 |
6 | 3 | Vincent Kriechmayr | 1:25:13 |
7 | 17 | Dominic Paris | 1:25:18 |
8 | 12 | Andreas Sander | 1:25:21 |
9 | 4 | Dustin Cook | 1:25:23 |
10 | 6 | Bostjan Kline | 1:25:36 |
11 | 5 | Hannes Reichelt | 1:25:40 |
12 | 20 | Thomas Dressen | 1:25:51 |
13 | 11 | Aleksander Aamodt Kilde | 1:25:71 |
14 | 21 | Ryan Cochran-Siegle | 1:25:72 |
15 | 14 | Adrien Theaux | 1:25:76 |
16 | 18 | Christof Innerhofer | 1:25:90 |
17 | 13 | Max Franz | 1:25:96 |
18 | 25 | Maxence Muzaton | 1:26:08 |
19 | 29 | Brice Roger | 1:26:10 |
20 | 32 | Matteo Marsaglia | 1:26:11 |
21 | 28 | Giles Roulin | 1:26:20 |
22 | 26 | Manuel Osborne-Paradis | 1:26:39 |
23 | 33 | Broderick Thompson | 1:26:45 |
24 | 31 | Jared Goldberg | 1:26:49 |
25 | 22 | Klemen Kosi | 1:26:50 |
26 | 8 | Thomas Tumler | 1:26:52 |
27 | 19 | Josef Ferstl | 1:26:81 |
28 | 23 | Joan Verdu | 1:26:86 |
29 | 35 | Natko Zrncic Dim | 1:27:05 |
30 | 37 | Henrik von Appen | 1:27:57 |