Alpine skiing-Italy's Brignone wins women's combined gold, Shiffrin disqualified

MERIBEL, France : Italy's Federica Brignone won the women's combined event at the World Ski Championships in Meribel, France on Monday after two solid races saw her finish 1.62 seconds ahead of Switzerland's Wendy Holdener.

American Mikaela Shiffrin, the reigning world champion in combined, was sixth fastest in the speed event but was disqualified in the slalom after straddling a gate shortly before the finish line.

Brignone completed the super-G in 1:10.28, 0.71 seconds quicker than Swiss Lara Gut-Behrami and Norway's Ragnhild Mowinckel who were joint second fastest, however the two speed specialists did not participate in the second leg.

Instead it was Switzerland's Holdener who won the slalom part, a fourth of second ahead of Brignone, but the overall margin was too big to threaten the 32-year-old.

Ricarda Haaser from Austria took third place.