Swiss skiers hit rock bottom in Bormio
The Swiss ski team are returning home empty-handed from the Alpine World Ski Championships in Bormio, Italy, which ended on Sunday.
This marks the first time in nearly 40 years that the Swiss have come away from a major championships without a single medal.
Switzerland came close to winning a medal four times during the competition.
Bruno Kernen came fifth in the downhill race, missing out on the bronze medal by sixteen-hundredths of a second.
Silvan Zurbriggen, who won a silver medal in the 2003 games at St Moritz, put in strong performances in both the combined and slalom races but ended up fifth and seventh respectively.
Nadia Styger was 0.39 of a second too slow to make it on to the podium in the super-G.
The last time Switzerland left the world championships without a single medal to its name was in 1966.
Duri Bezzola, president of Swiss Ski, summed up the mood as the team packed up and headed home.
“We are all just very glad that these world championships are finally over,” he told the Tages-Anzeiger newspaper.
Austria top table
Switzerland’s neighbours fared better in the medal stakes.
Austria won the most medals overall, taking home three gold, four silver and four bronze. Italy won four medals.
Germany struck gold in the last race of the games, the inaugural nations team event, while France took bronze.
Switzerland came sixth in the same event, with Didier Défago and Styger (super-G), Sonja Nef and Zurbriggen (slalom) and Daniel Albrecht and Fränzi Aufdenblatten (super-G and slalom).
Swiss Ski singled out Nef’s performance in this event.
“The best single result from the Swiss point of view was achieved by Sonja Nef, who won her slalom race,” it said in a statement released shortly after the results were made public.
Mediocre season
Switzerland’s top skiers were hoping to salvage what had been a mediocre season by going for gold at Bormio.
But former skiing champion Bernhard Russi told Swiss-Italian television that the lack of medals was no surprise given the lacklustre achievements of the Swiss team before they arrived in Italy.
It was a different story in the 1980s when the Swiss were a force to be reckoned with. At the Bormio championships in 1985, the country won no less than eight medals.
swissinfo with agencies
Switzerland’s neighbours won the following medals in Bormio:
Austria – 11
Italy – 4
France – 1
Germany – 1
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