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Show Stenmark, Girardelli show Olympics what they're missing World Cup downhill standings. stan-dings. Lewis has no World Cup points. Johnson, a top glider who doesn't perform as well in the technical turns of a course, illustrated those strengths and weaknesses in Cortina. He had the fourth fastest time in the upper flats, dropped back to eighth in the mid-section where the technical turns were located, and then climbed back into fourth on the lower flats. Then on Saturday in Sarajevo the downhill men had their first timed training runs on the Olympic course in preparation for Thursday's race. On that run Peter Mueller of Switzerland and Helmut Hoeflehner took two of the top three spots. Johnson was sixth. Sunday it was Johnson's turn, as he beat Mueller and Hoeflehner by half a second. Then on Monday Pirmin m Zurbriggen of Switzerland took the' top spot, but Johnson was just 22 hundredths hun-dredths behind in second. The three, training runs illustrated that the downhill course on Mt. Bjelasnica is a good gliders' course. Down-hillers Down-hillers such as Franz Klam-mer Klam-mer and Steve Podborski who prefer steeper courses with more sharp turns didn't finish in the top ten. For the U.S. Olympic women, the week has been filled with training also. They will be competing on Mt. Jahorina, and the word is that the courses are in excellent condition, with lots of new snow packed on top. Evidently there will be none of the gravel, twigs, and ice chunks which have greeted the women on some of the W orld Cup courses so far this season. Holly Flanders has the two best training downhill results for the American women, an eighth and a tenth place. Canada's Gerry Sorensen and Czechoslovakia's Olga Charvatova are racing well. "The course is really a lot more interesting this year," Flanders said, comparing it to last year's pre-Olympic race. "There's the long gliding sections on top and you can concentrate on that. Then you have the technical section in the middle, and the you can concentrate on the gliding again through the bumps on the bottom." On another Olympic note, two ski jumpers were added to the United States team: Jon Denney and Reed Zuehlke. Also, a member of the cross country team, Auden Endestad, will be competing at Sarajevo, as he was granted his U.S. citizenship citizen-ship Monday. i On the last week before the Winter Olympics in Yugoslavia, Yugo-slavia, two prominent racers who aren't eligible to compete com-pete Ingemar Stenmark of Sweden and Marc Girardelli of Luxembourg did their best to tarnish any medals which may be won. The pair, undoubtedly the best in the world along with Pirmin Zurbriggen of Switzerland this season, swept the first two places in both the final World Cup giant slalom and the final slalom before the Olympics. Otherwise, American downhiller Bill Johnson had a good week, placing fourth in the final downhill before the Olympics, and then taking a first, second, and a sixth in the three timed training runs at Sarajevo. Stenmark won his third giant slalom of the season Saturday in Borovetz, Bulgaria. Bul-garia. The win pushed his World Cup g.s. point total to 95, just five points behind leader Pirmin Zurbriggen. In second was Girardelli, whose points moved him into fourth on the g.s. standings. The top American was Tiger Shaw in 18 th, as the Mahres continue to search for their form of past years. Steve was 21st, while Phil did not finish. Sunday was another day for the non-Olympians to shine, only this time they switched places Girardelli won and Stenmark was second. Stenmark's performance perfor-mance in the slalom at Borovetz, Bulgaria kept him in first place on the World Cup slalom standings with 106 points. Girardelli is second with 95. The absence of the two racers at Sarajevo gives a hollow ring to the "best in the world" title which goes with the gold medal in the Olympic slalom and giant slalom races. Together, Stenmark Sten-mark and Girardelli have won almost everything in sight in this season's World Cup technical races. But both have been disqualified from the Olympics because they signed endorsement contracts. con-tracts. Phil Mahre was the top American of the day in sixth. Steve was 10th. They are now in 20th and 49th position respectively on the overall World Cup. The Mahres and Tiger Shaw will make up the U.S. team in the technical (slalom and g.s.) events. Meanwhile, Bill Johnson was doing his darnedest to give the U.S. alpine men something to cheer about. He continued his top-rate skiing in Cortina, Italy last Thursday Thurs-day by taking fourth in a World Cup downhill. Top honors of the day went to Helmut Hoeflehner of Austria. After the race the U.S. Olympic downhill team was chosen, consisting of Johnson John-son and Doug Lewis. Lewis finished 36th in Thursday's race, but made the team on the basis of two top-20 finishes on the World Cup season. Currently Johnson is sitting in nth place in the |