ST. MORITZ, Switzerland, Feb. 15 (UPI) -- Croatia's Janica Kostelic won her second gold medal of the World Championships Saturday with a convincing victory in the slalom.
The 22-year-old looked in imperious form in the morning's first run, leading Austrian Marlies Schild by 0.4 seconds, and did enough in the second run to ensure the victory.
The finish matched the placings in the first run, with Schild second and fellow Austrian Nicole Hosp taking bronze.
Kostelic's win follows her triumph in the combined event earlier in the week and will sit next to the Olympic gold she won in the slalom last year.
It is her fifth gold in major events and underlines her dominance of women's skiing - she was almost unstoppable at the Olympics, where she won the slalom, combined and giant slalom as well as silver in the super-G.
She achieved her latest triumph despite suffering from injuries to her right knee and right arm, the latter picked up in the giant slalom and the former expected to require surgery at the end of the season.
But talk of surgery would have been a long way from her mind as she beat Schild by .63 seconds and Hosp by nearly a second.
"I can live with the pain, but these were a difficult World Championships for me," Kostelic said. "I hope that people understand that I am happy to win these two medals. I never said I don't care about the World Championships, but they are less important to me than the World Cup."
She paid tribute to Anja Parson, who applied pressure with a stunning second run after languishing 15th after the first run.
"I think that Anja would have been a tough skier to beat today. She made a big mistake in her second run and without that mistake she might have won this race," Kostelic said.
Trailing Kostelic by 1.6 seconds, Parson tore up the Engiadina course the second time around and led the field until Hosp skied. Hosp pushed her into second, then Schild went one better and when Kostelic swept down to claim the gold, Parson was left outside what would have been her sixth podium finish of the year.
On Sunday Kostelic will watch the men's slalom, hoping to cheer brother Ivica to a medal.
