Marie Bochet looks to get back on track in super-combined

“We were first and foremost preparing for super-G, so it is not so difficult to switch to super-combined.”

After topping the leaderboard following the slalom portion of the super-combined on Tuesday (11 March), France’s Marie Bochet stumbled for the first time at the Sochi 2014 Paralympics in the women’s slalom standing race on Wednesday (12 March) — dashing her hopes of sweeping all five alpine events.

The 20-year-old, who has already won gold in downhill and super-G, looks to get back on track in the super-G portion of the super-combined at 14:00 (MSK) on Friday (14 March) at the Rosa Khutor Alpine Centre.

"Today I didn't have the level; other athletes did,” Bochet said on Wednesday. “Now I have to focus on the super-G of the super combined and to the giant slalom. … I feel a bit down now. It is going to be hard to swallow, but I don't want to worry too much. I still have two events to come.”

The slalom section of the women’s super-combined was run ahead of the super-G section of the race on Tuesday due to weather conditions, which also pushed the super-G section to Friday.

“We were first and foremost preparing for super-G, so it is not so difficult to switch to super-combined,” said USA’s Stephanie Jallen, who sits is in third place in the super combined standing class with a time of 57.98. “Super-combined is never an easy run. It's a battle getting down."

Bochet’s fall in the slalom allowed her chief rival, Andea Rothfuss of Germany, to win he fist Paralympic gold medal in a race that was moved to Wednesday because of the weather.

The 24-year-old is also in second place in the super combined standings after posting a 55.86 in the slalom portion of the event on Tuesday.

In the women’s super-combined visually impaired class, Russia’s Aleksandra Frantceva (58.68) is in first while Great Britain’s Jade Etherington (1:01.80) is in second and the USA’s Danelle Umstead (1:08.48) is in third.

Germany’s Anna Schafflhubber is first in the women’s super-combined sitting standings with a time of 1:00.73 in the slalom portion while teammate Anna-Lena Forster (1:01.4) is second and Austria’s Claudia Loesch (1:05.12) is third.

In the men’s super-combined sitting standings Austria’s Roman Rabl is holding strong atop the leaderboard with a time of 58.71. Germany’s Thomas Nolte is in second with a time of 59.25 and Austria’s Philipp Bonadimanni is in third, having clocked a 59.42.

On the men’s super-combined standing leaderboard, Russia’s Alexey Burgaev is in first with a slalom time of 50.30 while Canada’s Braydon Luscombe stands in second with a time of 52.17 and Austria’s Matthias Lanzinger is in third after logging a 52.43.

Valerii Redkozubov set the groundwork for a podium position on Friday’s final race of the men’s super-combined slalom visually impaired class by clocking a time of 50.60, ahead of Slovakia’s Miroslav Haraus (54.29) and Spain’s Gabriel Jaun Gorce Yepes (56.22).

"It is the first time something like that happened to me,” Gorce Yepes said of the break between the first and second components of the super combined. “I like it, because now I can just forget my performance in the slalom, and then have time to focus on the super-G."