Skiing: Meissnitzer double as snow hits super-G

IN THE end Alexandra Meissnitzer did not have to move a muscle to become the first Austrian to win the women's super-giant slalom World Cup.

The weather that had proved so fickle forced the organisers to cancelled the final race of the season yesterday. Too much snow on parts of the course in the Sierra Nevada mountains of southern Spain, after three postponements on Thursday, meant that Meissnitzer acquired her second World Cup title without a contest.

She had already claimed the overall crown before arriving in Spain and looks sure to finish supreme in the giant slalom competition which ends today. Meissnitzer has won four of the eight giant slaloms so far and only the veteran Austrian Anita Wachter has any chance of overhauling her.

Few could complain that Meissnitzer was not a worthy champion, despite the fact that the super-G series ended in anticlimax. She won only twice in eight races, but was never out of the top 15. Her only super-G challenger before Spain was compatriot Michaela Dorfmeister, but only a disaster could have changed the outcome.