Portugal Colonial - Historic comeback in Chamonix as Yule turns tide to win slalom

The 30-year-old, whose six previous World Cup wins have all come in slalom, was the last qualifier for the second run, having finished a mere 0.05sec ahead of Fabien Ax Swartz.

That meant Yule was first out of the gate in the second run and as the piste at Les Houches worsened, he had the best of the conditions.

His run of 47.22sec was over half a second faster than anyone else and gave him a combined time of 1min 36.24sec which was 0.16sec quicker than fellow Swiss Loic Meillard, who had been fifth-fastest on the first run.

Olympic champion Clement Noel, still looking for his first victory of the season, produced a fine first run to top the leaderboard at halfway but the Frenchman produced the third-slowest second run, over two seconds off Yule, to finish third, 0.18sec behind the winner on combined times.H

The Austrian Manuel Feller finished fourth and still leads the discipline standings, 164 points ahead of the German Linus Strasser, who had to settle for equal 14th.

The Chamonix slalom is the only race on the weekend's programme, as the two runs scheduled for Friday and Saturday were cancelled because of a winter thaw, making it impossible to hold a downhill in good conditions.

The women, who were due to ski at Garmisch in Germany, were also unable to compete for the same reasons.

The men's World Cup continues on Saturday in Bankso, Bulgaria, where a giant and a slalom are on the programme.

A.S.Diogo--PC