Pinturault leads giant slalom to close in on overall title
- Odermatt, the third skier to go, fluffed his lines to trail Pinturault by 1.66sec.
LENZERHEIDE: Alexis Pinturault comfortably led Saturday's final World Cup giant slalom after a fine first leg to place one hand firmly on the big crystal globe trophy.
The French skier arrived at this week's finals in Lenzerheide with a narrow 31 point cushion over Swiss title rival Marco Odermatt in the gripping battle for the overall men's title.
Odermatt was pinning his hopes of sinking Pinturault's title bid in his favoured downhill and super-g, only for both speed races to be called off due to bad weather.
That handed the advantage to Pinturault, who will be crowned overall champion if he wins Saturday's giant slalom and Odermatt finishes no better than ninth, or takes second and Odermatt 16th or worse.
Odermatt is trailing in 10th going into the second leg due off at 1200 GMT.
Pinturault, with bib number one, put in a commanding performance just when he needed it most to lead Austrian Stefan Brennsteiner by 0.81sec with Croat Filip Zubcic third at 1.04s.
Odermatt, the third skier to go, fluffed his lines to trail Pinturault by 1.66sec.
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