Marco Odermatt’s path to the top of the world

On Monday Marco Odermatt won a giant slalom as the first Swiss since Carlo Janka in 2011, and it will hardly be his last victory in this discipline. His career milestones so far.

Since last season it has been known at the latest that Odermatt has everything to be at the forefront in the World Cup. In fact, much more. And yet, before this season, you really didn’t know how things were going with the 23-year-old from Nidwalden. Will he be able to take advantage of the good results of the previous season after his knee injury? Odermatt himself was sure: “I have definitely reached the top of the world. If you’ve been on the podium once or twice, you don’t want to be tenth. “

And how he got to the top of the world! This season he has competed in three races, three times on the podium; on Monday he is at the top of the podium for the first time this season and for the first time in a giant slalom. He now leads the overall standings alongside 29-year-old veteran Alexis Pinturault. If it stays healthy, the SUV can do anything this winter.

Odermatt also started out very small. As his father reveals in “Blick,” his son took the stage for the first time at the age of two. In 2006, little Odermatt celebrated his first victory, in the Migros Cup he triumphed in the giant slalom. In 2007 he won a ski day with his idol Didier Cuche, who still remembers this meeting today. “Marco’s great talent was already evident at age ten. With him I did not have to correct almost anything in terms of skiing, I just had to adjust the position of his arms a little, “said the legendary Swiss” victory rider “.

Odermatt continues to develop step by step before setting the next milestone in March 2016. At the Sochi World Junior Championships he won gold in the giant slalom and two weeks later he was allowed to make his World Cup debut as a “reward”. There he ranks 22nd. In October of the same year, Odermatt secured his first World Cup points when he made his second “big” appearance.

Already setting his first World Cup mark, Odermatt will not miss the opportunity to participate in the World Junior Championships in Davos in early 2018. What does it mean to participate? The man from Nidwalden leads the competition to the ground, wins gold in the downhill, super-G, giant slalom, combined and team events. At least now it is clear that a great champion is growing.

In the 2018/19 season he was promoted to team A and immediately scored points regularly, in March 2019 for the first time on the podium. In the Kranjska Gora giant slalom he improved from 15th to 3rd place thanks to a brilliant second heat and a few days later, Odermatt improved in the Soldeu World Cup final. Ranked third after the first race, he shows no nerves and evokes the fastest race time in the snow and improves to second place, only Pinturault is even faster.

Odermatt claimed his first World Cup win at the Beaver Creek Super-G on December 6, 2019. Two weeks later, despite a bad blunder, he finished fifth in the giant slalom. In the arrival area, he was carried on a stretcher. The injury requires an operation, but after just one month, in January 2020, he will return to the World Cup. Nidwalden competes in the Super-G in Kitzbühel and finishes the race in 13th place. An early return is not without consequences, because Odermatt is accompanied by a pain that only subsides in summer.

But when the season started in Sölden in October, he was in top form and finished second in the giant slalom. In November, Odermatt, like his teammates Loîc Meillard and Justin Murisier, tested positive for the corona virus. The trio missed the parallel race at Lech / Zürs.

Last Saturday, Odermatt was already full of juice again, in the first of two giant slaloms at Santa Caterina he finished third before finally reaching the top of the podium in the race that was postponed from Sunday to Monday and with it the streak. giant that lasted for almost ten years. Swiss ends. You can only tip your hat to Odermatt and hope the devil stays healthy.