Men's Alpine Ski World Cup Giant Slalom in Sölden
The 2026-2027 Men's FIS Alpine Ski World Cup officially kicks off this Sunday in Sölden, Austria, with the traditional Giant Slalom season opener. The Sölden World Cup race is held at the Rettenbach glacier and has hosted the first race of the World Cup season since the 1999-2000 winter season.
Sölden has hosted the Men's World Cup Giant Slalom race 24 times. In 2025, 75 male skiers from around the world participated in this exciting event for ski fans.
Men's victory ranking (by country):
USA: 6
Switzerland: 6
Austria 5
France: 4
Norway: 3
Men's victory ranking:
4 wins: Ted Ligety USA 2011, 2012; 2013; 2015
3 wins: Hermann Maier AUT 1998, 2000, 2005; Marco Odermatt SUI 2021, 2022, 2025
2 wins: Alexis Pinturault FRA 2016, 2019; Bode Miller 2003, 2004
In October 2025, Marco Odermatt kicked off the new season with another victory in the Men's Alpine Ski World Cup Opener in Sölden. The 28-year-old Swiss skier, who has won at the Rettenbach Glacier three times (in 2021, 2022, and 2025), is now tied with Hermann Maier for the most wins in Sölden. Ted Ligety holds the record with four victories, having won in 2011, 2012, 2013, and 2015.
Marco Schwarz finished second, 0.24 seconds behind. Atle Lie McGrath took third place, finishing 0.27 seconds behind after moving up four positions with a strong second run.
Lucas Pinheiro Braathen, the Giant Slalom Olympic Champion, won the Giant Slalom Alpine Ski World Cup Crystal Globe during the 2025-2026 winter season. The 26-year-old Brazilian celebrated his second victory of the season in this discipline at the last race held in Hafjell, snatching the title from Marco Odermatt. The Norwegian-born skier, now representing Brazil, secured victory thanks to a flawless first run. Braathen exploited his leading position in the second run to beat Loic Meillard by 0.58 seconds. Atle Lie McGrath finished in third place, 0.87 seconds behind. Pinheiro Braathen kept his composure in the second run to claim Brazil's first-ever Alpine Ski World Cup Crystal Globe.
It was the first time the Giant Slalom Globe was decided in the season finale since the 2020-2021 winter season, when Marco Odermatt was 25 points ahead of Alexis Pinturault before the final race. Pinturault managed to win the race in Lenzerheide and clinch the Globe, while Odermatt was 11th.
In 2020, at the age of 20, Lucas Pinheiro-Braathen was the youngest winner in Sölden.
Lucas Pinheiro Braathen finished inside the Top 10 of every Giant Slalom (Two wins, three times 2nd, 5th, 7th, 10th, and a DNF in the season opener in Sölden) race he has managed to finish during the 2025-2026 winter season. He is the only skier to claim five Top-3 Giant Slalom finishes in a row during the current season (Alta Badia, Adelboden, Schladming, Kranjska Gora, and Hafjell).
Lucas Pinheiro Braathen became Brazil’s first-ever Olympic Winter Games gold medallist and earned the nation’s maiden World Cup win in Slalom in Levi this season. In Kranjska Gora, Pinheiro Braathen brought Brazil its first win in Giant Slalom, after finishing 2nd in three consecutive Giant Slalom races before.
It was his second career Crystal Globe. He won the Slalom title in 2023, representing Norway.
Lucas Pinheiro Braathen won the Giant Slalom title with 547 points. Swiss teammates Marco Odermatt and Loic Meillard finished in second and third place in the discipline's rankings.
Nine World Cup wins this season, two discipline Crystal Globes (Downhill and Super-G), and another Overall World Cup title. Last season, Marco Odermatt (Switzerland) once again demonstrated he is the most consistent and therefore the best ski racer of our era for the fifth consecutive time.
The 2-year-old Swiss Ace has won the Overall Crystal Globe five consecutive times: 2021-2022, 2022-2023, 2023-2024, 2024-2025, and 2025-2026. He finished the 2025-2026 winter season with 16 Crystal Globes (5 Overall, 3 in Downhill, 4 in Super-G, and 4 in Giant Slalom). With 16 Globes, Marco Odermatt is the third most successful men's skier of all time. Marcel Hirscher, with 20 Globes, leads the way; Ingemar Stenmark is second with 18.
Between 2021-2022 and 2024-2025, Marco Odermatt won four consecutive Giant Slalom Crystal Globes, matching the record set by Hermann Maier as only the second man in World Cup history to achieve this feat.
Odermatt has won 29 World Cup Giant Slalom races in his career, placing him third on the all-time list, only two wins away from second-placed Marcel Hirscher with 31 wins. Ingemar Stenmark leads the field with 46 wins.
Marco Odermatt will make his 200th World Cup start in Sölden. He finished more than half of his 199 previous races inside the top 3 (102) and won more than a quarter of them (54).
Loic Meillard, the reigning Olympic and World Slalom champion, finished third in last season's Giant Slalom World Cup standings. The 29-year-old Swiss skier has finished in the top three in the discipline Globe race in each of the past three seasons. A stat he almost matched in the Overall standings, with only a fourth-place finish last season.
He finished last season with three consecutive World Cup Giant Slalom podiums (a win in Schladming and two runner-up spots in Lillehammer and Kranjska Gora). This repeats his career-best streak of top-3 finishes. Meillard is also on his personal best streak of seven consecutive Top-10 finishes coming into Sölden.
Meillard is one of the most consistent skiers in the discipline and is looking to continue his point-scoring streak of 17 consecutive World Cup Giant Slalom races, which is the longest active one in the field. Meillard has a longer personal streak of 21 consecutive point-scoring races during the 2021-2022 and 2023-2024 seasons.
A win for Loic Meillard in Sölden would see him join Pirmin Zurbriggen in 3rd place for the most World Cup Giant Slalom wins among Swiss athletes with seven each. Marco Odermatt leads this list with 29 wins.
Giant Slalom world champion in Are in 2019, Giant Slalom Crystal Globe winner in 2020, and second in the discipline's standings in three of the past five seasons, Henrik Kristoffersen, a 34-time Alpine Ski World Cup race winner (26 in the Slalom, eight in the Giant Slalom), is always among the favourites to win a World Cup race.
Kristoffersen will make his 116th World Cup Giant Slalom start. He claimed 8 wins, 38 podiums and 84 top-10 finishes in his previous 115 starts.
Stefan Brennsteiner finished fourth in the Giant Slalom standings last season. He had never been this close to the season-long podium before in his career. His previous career-high place was sixth in the 2021-2022 winter season. Brennsteiner has made 87 World Cup Giant Slalom starts since his debut in Sölden in 2012, winning one race and claiming seven podiums.
Last season in Sölden, Marco Schwarz returned to the Giant Slalom podium after two years. His previous podium finish was in Alta Badia in December 2023. The 31-year-old Austrian skier made his comeback after a serious injury. At the end of 2023, he was leading the overall World Cup standings when a crash in Bormio resulted in a torn cruciate ligament. He spent nearly a year sidelined but showed promising signs of recovery last season, despite it being a hard and painful time. He struggled a lot and felt the most pressure from himself.
Austria celebrated another impressive result on its national holiday following Julia Scheib's victory, with Schwarz finishing second, Stefan Brennsteiner fourth, and World Champion Raphael Haaser, who had the fastest time in the second run, placing sixth.
Schwarz's second place made him the first Austrian Men's skier to reach the podium in Sölden since Roland Leitinger in 2021-2022. Leitinger also came second behind Marco Odermatt.
On December 21, 2024, Marco Schwarz won the last Giant Slalom of the Alpine Ski World Cup before Christmas in Alta Badia. After a strong first run and a strategic second, the Austrian skier returned to the top of the podium. He finished ahead of Lucas Pinheiro Braathen (+0.18) and teammate Stefan Brennsteiner (+0.22 seconds). He celebrated his seventh victory in the Alpine Ski World Cup. Schwarz secured Austria's first Giant Slalom victory in Alta Badia since Marcel Hirscher seven years ago.
A few days later, he secured his first victory in the Super-G, his eighth World Cup victory.
This season Marco Schwarz will focus his efforts on Giant Slalom, Super-G, and selected Downhill races and forgo Slalom races.
Atle Lie McGrath reached his second back-to-back Sölden Giant Slalom podium last season, finishing third. In 2024-2025 he was a part of a Norwegian podium sweep, joined by Alexander Steen Olsen in first and Henrik Kristoffersen in second. Only once before had skiers from a single nation swept the podium in Sölden. On October 25, 1998, Hermann Maier, Stephan Eberharter, and Heinz Schilchegger swept the podium. Christian Mayer finished fourth, Hans Knauss sixth, and Benjamin Raich eighth.
Alexander Steen Olsen will be returning to the Alpine Ski World Cup in Sölden. He missed the entire 2025-2026 winter season due to a knee injury after posting his best Giant Slalom season in 2024-2025, finishing fourth overall. The 25-year-old Norwegian skier claimed two wins (including his maiden Giant Slalom win in Sölden in 2024), three podiums, and five top-10 finishes that season.
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