BORMIO, Italy (Reuters) - Aksel Lund Svindal was denied a third successive downhill when he was pipped by Italian Dominik Paris at Bormio on Thursday.
Paris become the first Italian skier to win a men's World Cup race this season when he charged down the Stelvio course, one of the longest and most challenging on the circuit, in one minute 56.95 seconds.
He finished four hundredths inside the previous best time set by Svindal whose fellow Norwegian Kjetil Jansrud was third.
Slalom specialist Marcel Hirscher, who did not race on Thursday, leads the overall World Cup standings followed by Henrik Kristoffersen in second, Svindal third and Jansrud fourth. Svindal leads the season's downhill standings.
(Writing by Brian Homewood in Bern, editing by Pritha Sarkar)
