Manuel Feller of Austria Claims His First Globe in Slalom
Manuel Feller, an Austrian skier, has achieved his first career crystal globe in slalom on the World Cup tour. His victory came after the anticipated competition in Kranjska Gora was cancelled due to heavy rainfall affecting the Slovenian ski resort.
Feller’s achievement is underpinned by his impressive performance this season, winning four out of nine slaloms so far, thereby creating an indomitable lead of 169 points over the German skier Linus Strasser in the slalom leaderboard. His tour-de-force is teeing him up for a solitary race in the Alphine Skiing World Cup finals.
The skier’s new triumph, his crystal globe, could well be the crowning glory of his career, surpassing even when he clinched the slalom silver medal at the Alpine Skiing World Championships held at Saint-Moritz, Switzerland, in 2017.
Feller’s globe win makes it the eighth crystal globe that has been awarded to an Austrian skier in the past 12 seasons, the last one being won by Marco Schwarz during the 2020-21 ski season. Before Schwarz, Marcel Hirscher had a dominant run with six victories.
The Kranjska Gora event was originally scheduled to take place on Sunday but was moved forward to Saturday due to the cancellation of the giant slalom caused by poor piste conditions on the upper part of the run.
Then, due to the rain that caused irreparable damage to the slope, the International Ski Federation [FIS] was forced to give up plans for the competition altogether. They noted that logistical constraints made it impossible to relocate the World Cup event to another ski resort within such a short timeframe.