Germany’s Rebensburg Wins Surprising Gold In Women’s Giant Slalom, Mancuso Eighth

Germany’s Viktoria Rebensburg, who had never won a major ski race before, surprised everyone on Thursday by winning gold in Women’s Giant Slalom, the country’s first medal in the event in 1956.

The weather-interrupted event was completed Thursday morning after heavy fog forced a postponement of the second run. Rebensburg’s total time of 2:27.11 was just good enough for gold, narrowly edging Slovenia’s Tina Maze by only 0.04 seconds. Austria’s Elisabeth Goergl won bronze, her second such medal of the games.

American Julia Mancuso, the defending gold medalist, was fast, just not fast enough. She skied the third-best time in the second run, but it wasn’t quick enough to make up for a poor performance in Wednesday’s first run, which she was forced to restart because teammate Lindsey Vonn had fallen and was still on the course. Mancuso ended up eighth overall, ending her 2010 Winter Games in a disappointing fashion.

“I felt I was able to put down a really good second run today,” she said. “It just wasn’t enough. ... I was pretty close, but I guess I’ll wait for another four years.”

Mancuso has opted to skip Friday’s Slalom, the final Women’s Alpine event. She’ll head home having won a pair of silver medals in Vancouver.

After her finish on Thursday, Mancuso sought to ease tensions between her and Vonn.

Vonn said Wednesday she was “hurt” by “some negative things” Mancuso had said about her at these Olympics. That included Mancuso’s comments about Vonn drawing a lot of attention from the media and within the U.S. team.

Mancuso sought to diffuse the situation Thursday, saying: “The way that it came across, that it was a media-attention fight or something like that, is just ridiculous.”

Friday’s Slalom is set to begin at 1:00 p.m. ET. Sweden’s Anja Paerson is the defending gold medalist in the event.

More: SB Nation’s full coverage of the Winter Olympics and the 2010 Winter Olympics Medal Count Tracker.