Maria Riesch rides super-G to combined win

By Steve Keating

WHISTLER, British Columbia (Reuters) - Germany's Maria Riesch posted the fastest time in the super-G then held on in the slalom to win a World Cup super-combined on Sunday.

Riesch could only manage the seventh best time in the afternoon slalom leg but it was enough for a .09 second victory over Austria's Marlies Schild with an aggregate time of two minutes, 10.07 seconds.

Sweden's Anja Paerson, the super-combined world champion, was third in 2:10.38 and was followed by Austrians Nicole Hosp and Elisabeth Goergl.

"The super-G in the morning gave me a very a good base for winning the race because I had more than a second advantage over Marlies," Riesch told reporters.

"I was a little nervous in the slalom, I didn't want to go out and go home with zero points so my slalom run was a little bit careful.

"It was a little bit lucky to win with 9/100ths but you need some luck sometimes."

Riesch, second to American Lindsey Vonn in the season's only other super-combined, shot down a sun-bathed Franz's Downhill course in a time of 1:21.49 seconds in the morning super-G to take a .42 second lead over Julia Mancuso of the United States into the afternoon slalom leg.

Riesch, who leads the super-G standings, would need almost all of that advantage to fight off a challenge from Schild, a technical specialist with four slalom wins this season, and collect her sixth career victory and second of the season.