Alpine skiing-Canada's St-Germain stuns Shiffrin to take slalom gold

MERIBEL, France :Canada's Laurence St-Germain claimed a shock victory in the world championships slalom as she beat favourite Mikaela Shiffrin to the gold medal on Saturday.

The 28-year-old had never got close to winning a major race before but chose the perfect time to change that with a sensational second run to eclipse slalom great Shiffrin.

In denying the American a fifth world title in a discipline Shiffrin dominates, St-Germain became the first Canadian woman to win a slalom world title for 63 years.

Shiffrin led by 0.19 seconds from Swiss Wendy Holdener going into the medal run but a couple of errors through the early gates lost her time and she finished 0.57 seconds off the combined time set by the charging Canadian.

Remarkably, her second run time was only the 29th fastest although starting last meant the course was rutted.

Germany's Lena Duerr took the bronze medal with Holdener failing to finish her second run after pushing too hard.

"It's weird I was not expecting this," a joyous St-Germain, who was third after the first run, 0.61 seconds down on Shiffrin, told Eurosport in the finish area.

"I was really stressed before the second run, and kind of nauseous, then started, made a bit of a mistake but kept attacking. I was asking where I should stand for second place on the podium but I ended up in the middle!"

While Shiffrin will be disappointed not to win a fifth slalom world title she now has 14 medals from world championships, ahead of Swedish great Anja Paerson and behind only Germany's Christl Cranz who claimed 15.

Shiffrin's giant slalom victory on Thursday was her seventh gold from world championships. She also finished second in the super-G earlier in the championships.

St-Germain's shock win continued an