Méribel (France) (AFP) - Germany's Alexander Schmid and Norway's Maria Therese Tviberg claimed golds in the men and women's individual parallel events at the World Ski Championships on Wednesday.
After eight rapid-fire runs down the Roc de Fer piste in a knockout format, Schmid beat Austrian Dominik Raschner over two legs in the final by 0.50 seconds.
"It's a crazy day for me," said Schmid after becoming Germany's first individual world champion since 1989."It's a first podium, at the top, I'm really proud of myself.
"It means a lot – I didn't expect it, and I am so happy to be here with a gold medal, it is just amazing.
"Every run is difficult.Every run is a new chance...it's pretty important to stay focused on yourself and give your best.
"Every run is a new run.You have to keep going.It's no risk, no fun, and that was pretty fun."
Tviberg, a silver medallist with her country's quartet in Tuesday's mixed-sex parallel team event despite missing the actual final because of a heavy fall, was faster than Switzerland's Wendy Holdener by 0.67sec over their two final runs in warm, sunny conditions.
It was Holdener's second individual medal of these worlds after she also claimed silver in last week's alpine combined event.
"It means the world," said Tviberg, who like Schmid is 28 and without a World Cup victory, although the German has at least had three previous podium finishes.
"This is my job, you compete to be the best skier in the world and today that happened, not many people can say that.
"It's really emotional, it's my first podium.I took the risk, skied and it worked...Maybe we have an advantage in Norway, we think every medal counts, and we just go for it.
"I've never had a (individual) medal before and just to do that is amazing and then a gold on top of that, you can hear my voice is shaking.I always have stuff to say and I am speechless."
Feed me!
Tviberg said the relentless nature of eight races for the finalists was part and parcel of the day's racing.
"I've had people feeding me all day!" she said."I don't think about energy, just your heart going out of your chest and breathing all the time.
"Just put your head down and go."
Holdener said she had improved after the team event, her performance in which, she argued, had left as an "outsider, I didn’t ski really good, I drifted a lot".
"So, I knew yesterday if I wanted to win something today I had to improve and I am really happy I improved that much and could fight for gold."
Norway's Thea Louise Stjernesund, Tviberg's teammate in Tuesday's action, claimed bronze in a race-off against France's Marie Lamure.
The bronze in the men's event also went to a Norwegian, in the shape of Timon Haugen, who got the better of Austrian Adrian Pertl.
French hopes of a medal in the men's event suffered a first blow when defending champion Mathieu Faivre failed to negotiate qualification, a fate that also befell Olympic champion Clement Noel.
Alexis Pinturault, seeking a third medal on home snow after his combined gold and super-G bronze, was knocked out of the first round by Norway's two-time junior world gold medallist Alexander Steen Olsen.
"A mistake is very costly and unfortunately that's what I did," said Pinturault.
"I was given a surprise despite my pre-race inspection.The deficit was too big and although I reeled in some time (on the second run) it wasn't enough."
