Marco Odermatt (SUI) put an exclamation point on his dominant week in Beaver Creek with a dramatic giant slalom victory. It was his second World Cup win in four days, third in the last week-and-a-half and 49th overall. He posted a final time of 2:20.59.
Slalom specialist Alex Vinatzer (ITA) secured a runner-up finish (+0.23), his fourth career podium and first in the giant slalom discipline.
Henrik Kristoffersen (NOR) came in third (+0.34) and made history in the process. He now stands alone at fifth all-time in podium appearances for male Alpine skiers, passing the great Hermann Maier (AUT) with 97.
River Radamus (USA), who grew up down the road from Birds of Prey in Edwards, Colorado, continued to level up his skiing, claiming sixth. It was his best result of the 2025-26 season to date.
Odermatt, as he often does, watched 29 other racers leave the starting gates before him for their second runs. The last man skiing didn’t put together the fastest time (in fact, it was 25th among those who qualified for Run 2), but the near full-minute cushion he created in his first run gave him just enough of an edge to stave off the competition.
“He is like a power hitter who takes a full swing at every single ball, and he bats nearly .1000” said NBC Sports analyst and Alpine skiing icon Ted Ligety on the broadcast. “It’s amazing how impeccable his timing is. He makes one single turn, he gets all the maximum amount of power, and he can do it in any condition.”
For a while, it appeared Vinatzer would get his first-career World Cup win, as he held onto the lead from the mid-second run all the way to the very end. Of course, Odi snatched it away.
It was the “Swissblade’s” fifth victory at Beaver Creek. Only two other skiers have collected more: Maier (AUT) and Aksel Lund Svindal (NOR) with six apiece.
Odi has the opportunity to capture World Cup win No. 50 when the men are in Val-d'Isère, France for giant slalom and slalom races. He’s found tremendous success at the venue, having won four straight Cup events there dating back to 2021.
After struggling mightily in the first five races of the 2025-26 campaign, the Americans showed signs of life at Beaver Creek. On Thursday, it was Ryan Cochran-Siegle’s masterful skiing that landed him in second. Saturday, Radamus and RCS finished 12th and 13th, respectively, and then on Sunday, the former barely missed a top-five result. In the process, the duo collected valuable, ramification-bearing Cup points for Milan Cortina.
Cochran-Siegle’s Olympic pedigree is well-documented — the lone American Alpine skier to earn a medal at the 2022 Winter Games, his mom Barbara Cochran won Olympic gold in 1972 — but Radamus placed fourth in two events in Beijing. In the giant slalom, he came within 27 hundredths of a second from bronze glory. The wooden spoon stung like a splinter.
“I had dedicated my entire life to preparing for that moment, to preparing for the Olympics, and had the posters on my wall and all the rest,” he told NBC Olympics in July. “I remember sitting there in the finish, watching the podium ceremony and just feeling like such a failure.”
The Radamus redemption arc felt like it kicked into high gear on Sunday.
Ryder Sarchett and George Steffey, the two other Americans who started the Birds of Prey giant slalom, did not qualify for a second run.
The next time the men hit the slopes for World Cup competition will be in Val-d'Isère, France for giant slalom and slalom races. The remainder of the season’s Cup events will take place in Europe.