Moscow, Russia – Squaw Valley, Calif.’s Julia Mancuso ripped through the head-to-head style parallel slalom to win under the lights in Moscow on Tuesday night for her second Audi FIS Alpine World Cup win this season. Teammate Lindsey Vonn, of Vail, Colo., tacked another 60 points to her immense overall World Cup lead with third on the 170 foot tall ramp built in Luznhiki Olympic Complex as thousands of fans braved the fridgid Moscow tempuratures.

The bracket style event, presented by Soelden, Austria, the official European Training base of the U.S. Ski Team, capped a showcase of alpine skiing in the Russian capital. The country will host the 2014 Olympic Winter Games in Sochi.

Each match featured two runs with the fastest racer from the first earning a time advantage on the second. Vonn’s second run ousted her nearest competitor for the overall title, German Marie Hoefl-Riesch, from the Moscow podium as she made up for a .30 deficit to Riesch after the first run of the small final.

“Events like this are really exciting, anything can happen. You’re bummed out if you lose and when you win, it’s a big surprise,” said Mancuso, who defeated Austria’s Mikaela Kirchgasser in the final. “I knew that if you can have a good start, you can make up any amount of time, so I really focused on my start.

“Kirchi [Mikaela Kirchgasser] is a great slalom skier and she was really skiing fast in her heats, so I just had to plow down those gates,” she added.

“I’m excited to be on the podium today, but I’m also really happy for Jules for winning. She skied amazing. These parallel events are really tough, you can’t think about it, you just have to go for it,” said Vonn. “After my first run against Maria, I didn’t think that I’d make the podium – I was three tenths behind and I made it back. I think my last run was the best run of the day and that’s what put me on the podium.”

Frenchman Alexis Pinterault won the men’s event as Ted Ligety, America’s lone male entrant, was knocked out in the first round. The World Cup’s top 16 men and top 16 women were invited to compete. No Canadian ski racers made that cut.

“I think it’s really cool for everyone who lives in cities to see events like this and to have exposure to ski racing,” explained Mancuso. “It’s also cool to have big ski resorts like Soelden sponsoring things like this to show that the ski world is incredible. I hope we have more city events. This helps bring the skiing to the people and helps inspire them to go out and take that ski vacation that they’ve been dreaming to do.”

OFFICIAL RESULTS
Audi FIS Alpine World Cup
Moscow, Russia – Feb. 21, 2012
Slalom

Women:

Men: