Brilliant Vlhova ends giant slalom 'crisis' with emotional win on home snow

Emotional Petra Vlhova banished her giant slalom demons and hailed a 'dream' after claiming a memorable World Cup victory on home snow in Jasna.

Slovakian Vlhova had not won a giant slalom race for over a year but bounced back in style on Sunday as she beat New Zealand's Alice Robinson by 0.16s

American Mikaela Shiffrin finished third but it was Vlhova, 2019 world champion in the discipline, who reigned supreme to cut the gap on Lara Gut-Behrami at the summit of the overall standings.

Gut-Behrami could only muster a ninth-place finish and Vlhova revelled in ending her run of disappointing giant slalom displays.

The 25-year-old said: "Everybody who watches our sport will know that in my last giant slalom races I was not in good shape.

"I had a small crisis but I trained a lot, I came here to my home (event), I tried to release the power inside me, and this was my dream."

Vlhova lay second after her first run after clocking a time of 1:08.51, 0.16s behind Saturday slalom champion Shiffrin.

But she swiftly overhauled that advantage as a brilliant second of 1:08.15 propelled her into the lead.

Robinson, 19, was the fastest on the second run – with a time of 1:07.49 – but it was not enough to usurp Vlhova who claimed her fifth World Cup victory of the season.

Overall giant slalom leader Marta Bassino was fourth in Slovakia, while Austria's Ramona Siebenhofer finished fifth with a time of 2:18.00.

Vlhova has now racked up 1220 World Cup points this season and lies just 36 behind Gut-Behrami heading into next week's slalom double in Are, Sweden.