{"id":573053,"date":"2026-02-07T14:36:12","date_gmt":"2026-02-07T14:36:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/573053\/"},"modified":"2026-02-07T14:36:12","modified_gmt":"2026-02-07T14:36:12","slug":"swiss-racer-franjo-von-allmen-wins-mens-downhill-first-gold-medal-of-milan-cortina-games","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/573053\/","title":{"rendered":"Swiss racer Franjo von Allmen wins men’s downhill, first gold medal of Milan Cortina Games"},"content":{"rendered":"

BORMIO, Italy (AP) \u2014 Swiss racer Franjo von Allmen captured the Olympic downhill Saturday to win the first gold medal at the Milan Cortina Games<\/a>.<\/p>\n

On a picture-perfect day in Bormio, von Allmen powered through the challenging Stelvio course in 1 minute, 51.61 seconds. His time was good enough to withstand the charge of Italy\u2019s Giovanni Franzoni, who finished with the silver medal. Franzoni\u2019s teammate, the 36-year-old Dominik Paris, had a fast run to take bronze and knock Marco Odermatt of Switzerland off the podium.<\/p>\n

Von Allmen keeps the Olympic downhill title in the Swiss family. Beat Feuz won the event at 2022 Beijing Games before retiring.<\/p>\n

The 24-year-old von Allmen sometimes flies under the radar of Odermatt, who\u2019s won four straight overall World Cup titles. They\u2019re fast friends and friendly rivals. They share course information but hold a little back, too. Turns out, von Allmen had the better inside track on the demanding hill. <\/p>\n

It\u2019s been quite a run for von Allmen, who won the downhill at the world championships in Austria<\/a> last winter.<\/p>\n

The stands were packed with flag-waving fans. Some of the biggest cheers were reserved for Franzoni and then, the next racer to go, Paris.<\/p>\n

This is a breakout season for the 24-year-old Franzoni, who\u2019s from Manerba del Garda, located about 200 kilometers south of Bormio. More specifically, it\u2019s been a breakout 22 or so days<\/a>. He won a World Cup super-G in Wengen, Switzerland, on Jan. 16 and followed that up with a downhill victory in Kitzb\u00fchel, Austria, the following week. <\/p>\n

Paris knows this course well, having won seven World Cup races at the venue. He hails from Val d\u2019Ultimo, which is about three hours away \u2014 or a 15-minute helicopter ride.<\/p>\n

It was Paris\u2019 first Olympic medal in his fifth Winter Games. He now becomes a bronze medalist in addition to being the vocalist of a heavy metal band called \u201cRise of Voltage.\u201d<\/p>\n

The 27th racer to take the course, Kyle Negomir found a fast line and vaulted into 10th place for the top American finish.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

AP skiing: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/alpine-skiing<\/a> and AP Olympics: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/milan-cortina-2026-winter-olympics<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BORMIO, Italy (AP) \u2014 Swiss racer Franjo von Allmen captured the Olympic downhill Saturday to win the first…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":573054,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[10],"tags":[224667,191963,3881,248983,248982,248986,248985,248984,44831,235115,62,67,132,68,248987],"class_list":["post-573053","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-2026-milan-cortina-olympic-games","tag-2026-winter-olympics","tag-ap-top-news","tag-dominik-paris","tag-giovanni-franzoni","tag-italy-olympic-team","tag-kyle-negomir","tag-marco-odermatt","tag-olympic-games","tag-send-to-apple-news","tag-sports","tag-united-states","tag-unitedstates","tag-us","tag-val-dultimo"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116029855200575487","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573053","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=573053"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573053\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/573054"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=573053"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=573053"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=573053"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}