After 21 months of disappointing results and...

After 21 months of disappointing results and thoughts of retirement, 29-year-old Ingemar Stenmark of Sweden scored a record 80th World Cup victory in a men’s giant slalom race at La Villa, Italy.

“It was my greatest victory ever, because everybody thought I was done,” said Stenmark, the overall World Cup champion from 1976 through 1978. “I had built a lot of psychological pressure after failing to win for so long.”

Stenmark had last won a World Cup race--also a giant slalom--at Vail, Colo., in March 1984.

In other World Cup action, Sweden’s Gunde Svan won a 30-kilometer event at Biwabik, Minn., and Erika Hess of Switzerland moved to the top of the women’s overall standings with a victory in a slalom event at Savognin, Switzerland.