0.01 s on new skis: Moltzan wins Sölden, the first woman to win on Van Deer

Paula Moltzan in the Soldeu slalom, 11 February 2024. Photo: Tournasol7 via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0

Paula Moltzan won the women's giant slalom in Sölden on Saturday 24 October 2026 by 0.01 seconds, her first World Cup victory in her 149th start. It was also her first race on Van Deer skis, the brand founded by Marcel Hirscher, and the first World Cup win by a woman on them. On Sunday Lucas Pinheiro Braathen won the men's race on Atomic. Here are both results, the skis under the podiums, and what they share with the skis you can buy.

• Women's giant slalom, 24 October: Moltzan (USA) 2:14.82, Lara Colturi (ALB) +0.01 s, Emma Aicher (GER) +0.52 s; Mikaela Shiffrin led after run 1 and finished 7th.
• Moltzan, 32, changed skis over the summer to Van Deer; Colturi moved from Blizzard to Head; Franziska Gritsch moved to Atomic.
• Men's giant slalom, 25 October: Pinheiro Braathen (BRA) 1:44.72 on Atomic, Loïc Meillard (SUI, Rossignol) +0.48 s, Marco Odermatt (SUI, Stöckli) +0.49 s; strong wind moved the start down to the reserve position.
• FIS rules for World Cup giant slalom in 2026/27: radius at least 30 m, length 188 to 192 cm for women and 193 to 200 cm for men, waist at most 65 mm.
• The women raced 357 m of vertical with 45 gates per run on the Rettenbach glacier, the men 308 m with 38 gates after the lowered start.

Overnight snowfall delayed the start by about 30 minutes, ORF reported. Run 1 was sunny; run 2, in snowfall and poor visibility, turned the order upside down: Shiffrin led run 1 by 0.14 s and dropped to 7th, Moltzan climbed from 5th. Defending champion Julia Scheib crashed in run 1 while leading on the splits and reported no cruciate ligament tear, ORF wrote. Aicher called the podium "very, very unexpected" to the same broadcaster.

Source: FIS result list, run 1 set by Kai Grønningsæther (NOR), run 2 by Luca Agazzi (ITA). "It feels like a fairytale right now," Moltzan said in the FIS race report. "I never would have expected it would have happened in the first race on new material." At 32 she is the oldest first-time winner in the women's World Cup, ahead of Anna Swenn Larsson, who was 31 years and 5 months old at her first win in Killington on 27 November 2022, alpineskiworldcup.com noted.

Three of the first seven changed brands over the summer. Moltzan signed with Van Deer as the only woman on the World Cup tour on that brand, NBC Sports wrote. The win was the first by a woman on Van Deer-Red Bull Sports skis, according to SnowBrains, which also reports Colturi's move from Blizzard to Head. Moltzan told Ski Racing that the brand had to "start kind of from scratch and develop an entire women's line".

Brands per the FIS race report, Ski Racing and SnowBrains, 24 October 2026. Head had four skiers in the top six, with Hector 4th and Rast 6th; Julia Scheib and Petra Vlhová race on Rossignol.

On Sunday 25 October the course was shortened because of strong wind on the upper part of the Rettenbach glacier, AP reported. FIS moved the start to the reserve position a few hours before the race, 5min.at wrote. Pinheiro Braathen led run 1 by 0.24 s and held on for his second Sölden win after 2020, 0.48 s ahead of Meillard, with Odermatt a further 0.01 s back: the same margin that decided the women's race. Third place was Odermatt's 103rd World Cup podium in his 200th start, Neveitalia counted. Raphael Haaser set the fastest second run, 51.90 s, and climbed from 20th to 5th. Marco Schwarz, 2nd in Sölden in 2025, went out after a few gates. "I wanted to try the cheeky line. I think it was a bit too cheeky," he told laola1.

Times and brands per the FIS result list: start 2,978 m, finish 2,670 m, 38 gates per run, set by Niclas Kjelsli (NOR) and Nick Cooper (BRA); 69 men started, 26 finished both runs. Rossignol had four skiers in the top ten and Atomic three. Eirik Hystad Solberg in 8th was the best of eight Van Deer starters; Henrik Kristoffersen, listed on Head, finished 22nd. Across the field Atomic and Rossignol had 11 starters each, Head 10, Van Deer 8.

Very little in the numbers, a lot in the construction. For World Cup giant slalom the FIS equipment specification 2026/27 sets a radius of at least 30 m, a waist of at most 65 mm and, new this season, a weight cap of 4.9 kg (women) and 5.1 kg (men) for ski, plate and binding; we compared that cap with shop skis in our article of 21 October.

The race ski itself is in our catalog: the Van Deer GS World Cup comes in 188 and 193 cm with a 30 m radius and a 65 mm waist, according to the maker's figures. The shop skis from the same families have far shorter radii: the Van Deer Pro (68 mm, 13 to 19 m at 168 to 182 cm), the Head Worldcup Rebels e-Race (68 mm, 12.9 to 16.8 m at 160 to 180 cm) and the Atomic Redster G9 (67 mm, 15 to 17 m at 166 to 176 cm). What they share with the race skis is the narrow waist of 65 to 68 mm, which keeps the edge close to the boot on hard, machine-made snow like the snow Sölden stored over the summer for this opening weekend. For a shortlist of hard-snow carvers, the Pick-a-ski tool ranks the catalog on edge grip and carving.

• FIS result lists, women's (24 October) and men's (25 October) giant slalom Sölden 2026; FIS race report, 24 October 2026; FIS Specifications for Alpine Competition Equipment 2026/27 (July 2026)
• Women's race: ORF Sport, Ski Racing, NBC Sports, SnowBrains, alpineskiworldcup.com (all 24 October 2026)
• Men's race: AP via US News, laola1, Neveitalia, 5min.at, ORF Sport, Tiroler Tageszeitung (all 25 October 2026)
• Pick-A-Ski catalog, maker's figures for the Van Deer, Head and Atomic models named above