What will Hirscher's future bring?

[h.harb]

http://allsports.com.gh/other_sports/the-chase-marcel-hirscher-closes-in-on-fis-alpine-skiing-world-cup-overall-title-id3581935.html

Is this the turning point in Hirscher's career? Is it time to focus on Super G and GS, and leave slalom behind. What are the advantages and disadvantages? GS and Super G skis are similar. GS is great training for Super G and vice versa. Slalom is the outlier in alpine ski racing. Skis are totally different and the turns are tight and results unpredictable. Slalom requires the most training to hold a top 3 finishing position.

It makes sense from an energy expenditure stand point to use Super G as the second event to GS; if you are going for your 5th straight overall world cup title in a row (next season). It's one run and no practice on that run needed, you are in and out. Easy points?? If you can ski like Hirscher, yes.

It will be interesting. My feelings are that Hirscher likes the slalom turns, and he likes the athletic requirements of slalom. It would be a loss to ski racing not having him in top form for slalom. He also may see leaving slalom as a copout for achieving his historical overall wold cup legacy. I'm sure he wants to do it his way, win slaloms and GS. But what is the smartest way to do it. Stenmark was able to do it, but he didn't win 4 World Cup overall titles in a row. Hirscher has not yet, but at this writing, the odds are definitely in his favor. He can always, from time to time run a Super G to get insurance points. Either way, it will be very interesting to watch history in the making.

[speedcontrol]

Congratulations to Marcel Hirscher and Anna Fenninger both of them winning their men and women overall titles after today's SL and GS in Meribel ! Looking at the men overall standing one can say that under the current circumstances a strong technical skier like Hirscher can win the overall without venturing into speed events at least untill Jansrud or Reichelt or any other of the top speed athletes decides to take the SL/GS direction and shows a consistent skiing there. Only then the current king can be intimidated and his 5th straight overall world cup title will be under question .......unless of course he and coaches decide it is time to redirect his career and focus on speed, but keeping the '' rhythm'' in SL (vey difficult,but not impossible) Looking at the women standing however shows that a great versatility will be needed from anyone that wants to knock Anna and Tina down. The very talented (and young) technical Mikaela has still a lot of time to evaluate and reevaluate her priorities if she aims in the future also anything else then the slalom globe (that she perfectly deserves this season).Congrats for her as well .

[h.harb]

Some random comments form my Facebook pages.
Hirscher came out and won the World Cup clean, and the Slalom Globe, he didn't back into it, he came out and took it.
Amazing season: three globes, 4 overalls in a row, no one has done this before, not Stenmark, not Tomb, not Marc Girardelli, not Hermann Maier. Marc G. does have 5 overall Globes however.

Lewis keeps saying Ted is the best GS skier of all time, I dispute that. He still has only matched Michael von Grünigenin's number of GS wins. He's far from Stenmark. Hirscher will pass Ted in GS victories in 2 seasons.

The finsih to this season Hirscher was incredible. Winning a GS by 3.28 seconds, March 1st, and winning the last slalom, amazing strength stamina and conditioning.

We are watching history in the making, good history for a change. On this pace of seasonal wins, and the same number of years racing, as Stenmark, Hirscher can pass Stenmark in 8 seasons from now. This puts him at 34yrs old, many good slalom racers still out there at 34 years old that were never as good as Hirscher from the beginning.
Who can do what Hirscher did today, the last race of the season, with that much energy. He was holding back and conserving energy and points during the season. You could see during the season, after a few DQ's and DNFs in Slalom, Hirscher backed off. Today was different, second run, Hirscher won it, going away. The course had more turns out of the falline. The rounder the better for him. Pintaurault second.

And I have not even started on the amazing tiny women, Anna Fenninger.

[gaku]

Hats off to the Austrians, have we ever seen better skiiers?

We are watching history in the making, good history for a change.

Speaking of history, Kristoffersen almost ended this season with two world cup victories. Only 19 years old, already 4 WC victories, an Olympic medal and the most gold Medals of any junior skier (6) ever, I have no doubt Hirscher will have a formidable opponent to face in the years to come. The most impressive thing about Henriksen, except his technique (his footwork is pmts perfection), is how dedicated he is. If you could listen to his interviews, you'd be surprised to hear how mature that guy is. Incredible mentality, dedication and focus. With that kind of focus backing up his talent, I think we can expect him to write a chapter of history himself in the years to come.

[Meeks]

This quote below from Hirscher this past week doesn't sound like a guy who will take the easy way Harald.
My guess is he will ski slalom because as you say it is the most technical event and he wants or actually needs to challenge himself.

"I think that, in me, there's an engine that wants to see me winning all the time"