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France beats Slovakia to win team event at ski world champs

From left, gold medalists of France Alexis Pinturault, Mathieu Faivre and Tessa Worley celebrate in the finish area after the final of the team event at the 2017 FIS Alpine Skiing World Championships in St. Moritz, Switzerland, Tuesday, Feb. 14, 2017. (Gian Ehrenzeller/Keystone via AP) (Gian Ehrenzeller / AP)
Associated Press

ST. MORITZ, Switzerland – France beat Slovakia in the team event final to win its first medal at the ski world championships on Tuesday.

The quartet of Adeline Baud Mugnier, Mathieu Faivre, Alexis Pinturault and Tessa Worley won on a time tiebreaker of 0.08 seconds after each team won two legs of parallel slalom races.

Slovakia’s silver medal team was Matej Falat, Veronika Velez Zuzulova, Petra Vlhova and Andreas Zampa. On Saturday, Zuzulova and Vlhova should be among the medal contenders in slalom, with Mikaela Shiffrin of the United States a strong favorite.

Sweden took bronze, winning 3-1 against a Switzerland team which included Luca Aerni and Wendy Holdener, the gold medalists in individual combined events.

It was a first career gold medal for French star Alexis Pinturault, who previously had two bronzes in giant slalom from the 2014 Olympics and 2015 worlds.

The team event will debut on the Olympic program at the Pyeongchang Winter Games next year. It was introduced at the world championships in 2005, and Austria won three of the previous five editions.

Austria was eliminated in the quarterfinals by Sweden, and its star Marcel Hirscher lost his race in both rounds. The United States, racing without Shiffrin, lost to Canada in the round of 16, on a tiebreaker after a 2-2 tie.