SAALBACH-HINTERGLEMM, Austria — Franjo von Allmen won gold in the men’s downhill at the Alpine skiing world championships Sunday as the Swiss team swept the speed events.
Von Allmen beat silver medalist Vincent Kriechmayr by 0.24 seconds. The Austrian won the world title in both downhill and super-G four years ago.
His Swiss teammate Alexis Monney was 0.31 behind in third to take the bronze.
Defending champion Marco Odermatt was fifth, two days after the Swiss star won gold in the super-G. Von Allmen finished 12th in that race.
“It’s hard to realize what happened,” von Allmen told Austrian TV. “After the super-G, I really thought, ‘Now I should attack, I have nothing to lose.’ I went full risk and it was on the limit, but it worked.”
Switzerland has dominated the downhill on the World Cup circuit this season, with four wins and five second places from five events.
Von Allmen said sharing the podium with Monney underlined the strength of the Swiss team.
“Marco dominated the super-G, today two others are on the podium, that makes a cool atmosphere in the team,” von Allmen said.
The 23-year-old von Allmen is competing in his first worlds. He has yet to win a downhill on the World Cup circuit but finished runner-up three times this season and won a super-G in Wengen.
Racing in partly cloudy conditions and with temperatures slightly higher than during the three training runs earlier this week, von Allmen was not clean in the first part and his skis rattled over the bumps.
Reaching a top speed of over 75 mph, von Allmen mastered two spectacular jumps where racers soared nearly 50 yards.
Von Allmen made the V-sign and pretended to bite his nails when he sat in the leader seat, but no racer came close to beating his time.
Italian veteran Dominik Paris was 0.45 behind in fourth, and Bryce Bennett was the best American finisher in 10th.
The marquee event of the worlds was attended by 22,500 spectators, with 15,000 in the sold-out stands around the finish area.
Several standouts missed the race due to injury, most notably former overall World Cup champion Aleksander Aamodt Kilde of Norway and French speed specialist Cyprien Sarrazin.
The next event at worlds is the new women’s team combined, in which one racer competes in the downhill and a teammate races the slalom run with both times to be added, that is scheduled for Tuesday.
