Kitzbühel, Austria (Thursday, January 23, 2003) - World super G champion Daron Rahlves is no different than any downhiller in history in looking at the fabled Hahnenkamm in Kitzbuehel as the Super Bowl of his sport. On the eve of the 63rd running down the famouse Streif, Rahlves talked about what Kitzbuehel means to downhill ski racers.


Last year was a tough year for me. I look forward to racing here at Kitzbuehel every single year. It's my favorite race, my favorite hill to ski. I've had some decent success here in the past. Last year year unfortunately I crashed at the bottom of the Steilhang, so it was over pretty quick. I've been waiting since that day to come back here -- for a full year -- to show myself what I have on this kind of hill. I'm really excited to be back in Kitzbuehel right now. In our first training run, the conditions were so-so on the top, but from the bottom of the Steilhang down they were incredibly nice and prepared great. Hopefully this warm weather will get changed around and we get some cold stuff, get some powered snow and put some fast speeds up and rock on Friday and Saturday.

I'm feeling really good. This season so far has been very good as far as the consistency levels I've been putting out. I feel that even some of my best races this year I haven't skied a great run, but it's there. I have some good speed and am just feeling really confident coming into Kitzbuehel and wanting to really take this thing.


Kitzbuehel, because of what this place is all about -- I mean, the sheer challenge up on the hill, you get into the start and your blood starts to boil and you get a big smile on your face because this place is so challenging, it's a really difficult hill and tests everything you have as an athlete, both physically and mentally. Also because of the fans the recognition this place gets, you're not a veteran on the Ski Team until you've made Kitzbuehel. There's been years of buildup and talk about this race. For me growing up, all those reasons make it the number one race for me to come out and putting down my best run ever and winning here at Kitzbuehel -- it's the biggest thing I can ever imagine.

I'm feeling good right now. I always get really excited when I come here -- the crowd and and energy -- it really helps me to step up to the next level.

I get excited every year I walk into Kitzbuehel, looking at the the town and checking out the mountain. I first came here in the summer to walk down the mountain and see what it's all about -- it's the only race where I've done it. My first year was 1999, the year after the Olympics. Since then, every first run I get a little nervous and feel the butterflies -- it makes you feel alive!


Our Team altogether has been the best it's every been since I've been on it. With my success the last couple years, and Bode's, it's brought a lot to the team. One of the younger guys on our Ski Team, Marco Sullivan from Tahoe, he's been skiing really well, had a great race in Beaver Creek where he was sixth, we had three guys in the top eight at Beaver Creek, and when you have that kind of success everyone feeds off each other and it breeds more success and we start to feel confident as a team. When your coaches are confident and your whole organization is confident and the athletes are confident you can start doing some great things and really being a factor on the World Cup.


Nothing could ever make up for the way I skied last year at Salt Lake. IT was a big disappointment for me. I was concentrating so much on winning and coming off a great season in 2001 I really felt I could do it. But I think I was thinking about the wrong things and I wasn't focused on what it takes for me to ski fast. For sure, I talk about winning, that's my major goal But the main focus every single day is just coming out here and skiing as well as I can -- being smart tactically, attacking where I should and being safer in other spots. I just try to break it down and to be as tactful as far as I can so I can have my best race. And if I ski well, if I leave everything I have on the hill and if I couldn't have done anything better, I'll be very satisfied at the end of the day and however it works out it works out.


I'm always really fast on the top section, but what's most important to me is coming out off the Steilhang with a lot of speed onto the flats. That's one section -- that 22 or 23 second flat road -- where I need to be coming in with more speed than anyone else. If I have a good top section and take a lot of speed into the road, from there down as soon as I get off of the Alte Schneisse it's back to the type of course I'm really fast on so I think that's the key for me. And really nailing it off the Hausberg on the sidehill -- that's where a lot of speed is made. Those are the two places I'm going to focus on first.


That's another reason Kitzbuehel is such an important race because it gets a lot of attention in the U.S. It's huge and everyone knows about Kitzbuehel when skiing comes up. I was pretty amazed (after Bormio). I think know the Americans are starting to pay more attention to us and if we have success on the World Cup, they see what's going on. I flew home the day after Bormio and on the plane and in the airports in Washington and San Francisco, people I didn't even know were coming up to me and congratulating me. It was all over the papers. It was shocking that people knew what was going on all the way over in Italy. Interest is definitely a lot higher for World Cup skiing than it has been in the past.


It's just the intensity, all around -- what the hill is like, what the people are like. I know for me, just looking out of the start and the first two turns, thinking about how fast you're going over the first jump, the Mousefalle, you have to take charge right from the start. Then the sidehill at the bottom -- you're almost completely spent and you just have to keep pushing it to the max and looking for speed everywhere. You can see it on TV, if somebody really wants this race they're really going to kick out of the start and hammer with everything, and you see some other guys kick out and just let gravity take them down the first few gates. It's all about how much you want it.