Shiffrin ready to pounce in combined at Cortina worlds

CORTINA D'AMPEZZO: American Mikaela Shiffrin sat in prime position to challenge for gold after the super-G of the alpine combined event at the world championships on Monday.

Shiffrin, 25, finished third down the 2.15km-long Olympia delle Tofane course, just 0.06sec off Italian Federica Brignone's leading time of 1min 22.11sec.

The second part of the combined, the slalom, will be raced at 1210 GMT.

Shiffrin is a four-time world slalom gold medallist and will be confident of turning the screw with technical skills much more developed than rivals more adept at the speed events.

Double defending champion Wendy Holdener of Switzerland finished in 14th spot, at 0.97sec.

World Cup overall leader Petra Vlhova was seventh, the Slovak who is also a slalom specialist having just 0.40sec to make up on the second run.