VAL GARDENA, Italy, Dec. 20 (UPI) -- Norway's Aksel Lund Svindal breezed to victory in Friday's men's super G on one of his favorite World Cup courses.
Svindal won the event at Val Gardena, Italy, for the third time in his career, besting Canadian Jan Hudec by 0.58 seconds and third-place Adrien Theaux of France by 0.91 seconds.
Despite some fog on the course, Svindal, the overall point leader in the World Cup standings, looked right at home during his smooth run of 1 minute, 35.82 seconds. Hudec and Theaux were the only competitors to get within a second of Svindal.
"The snow is always great here and I like the preparation," said Svindal. "It is always perfect."
The win made Norway the seventh nation in history to win 100 World Cup races.
Bode Miller was the top U.S. finisher with an eighth-place time of 1:37.37. He was in good position after the first half of the race but a bump heading into a turn near the bottom cost him just enough time to miss the podium.
Miller said afterward Val Gardena was not producing the speeds at critical moments that some of his competitors were expecting. "This course is just so easy, everyone is just pushing too hard," he said. "You are seeing guys going too straight and blowing out of the course because they're looking for speed where there isn't any. That was a bit what I did, but I just got away with it."
