Austria's Sölden will launch this weekend the new season in which the hopes of Slovenian fans will again rest exclusively on giant slalom and downhill Olympic champion Tina Maze.
The season will start with giant slalom races for women and men on Saturday and Sunday respectively, and 31-year-old Maze is hoping for a good start, which will be needed if she is to reclaim the title of overall World Cup champion.
After a record-breaking 2012-2013 season, she lost the title last year after poor opening performances, but the two Olympic victories showed she had timed her form perfectly.
The all-round skier, who is one of just six women who have won in all five World Cup disciplines and one of three to do it in a single season, has a new coach this season, Italian Valerio Ghirardi, best known as the coach of former champion Isolde Kostner.
Maze, who will also be defending in Vail and Beaver Creek in February next year her super-g gold from the 2013 World Championships in Schladming, notably announced recently she would take a break next season.
"I'm planning a break which will however not mean a definitive end of my career. Right now I don't know whether I'll say good-by to my skies after the 2014/15 season," Maze said in an interview earlier this month.
Meanwhile, things continue to look bleak for the rest of the women's and even more so the men's team.
Ilka Štuhec, a 24-year-old former three-time junior World Champion, is worth highlighting in the women's team, having managed a few top 10 finishes in recent years, but she had ankle problems before the season.
Nothing is on the other hand left of the once respected Slovenian men's alpine skiing team. Novices Žan Kranjec and Mišel Žerak will represent it in Sölden on Sunday.
Source: The Slovenia Times
