SKIING : Pfeifer’s Fall Gives Lindqvist Slalom Title

Ingemar Stenmark decided against joining the U.S. Pro Tour this winter, but Swedish skiers on the circuit are doing well without him.

Niklas Lindqvist, born in Stockholm 25 years ago, won the slalom of the America’s Opening Cup Sunday and left Alpine Meadows with $7,100. He trailed Roland Pfeifer by 0.108 of a second after the first run of the final, but Pfeifer, from Austria, fell near the finish of their second run, giving Lindqvist the victory.

Phil Mahre of Yakima, Wash., made it to the quarterfinals after going out in the round of 16 during Saturday’s giant slalom, but the three-time World Cup champion crash-landed off the first of two jumps and fell an automatic 1.5 seconds behind Austrian Werner Herzog after their first run.

His 0.236-second margin over Herzog in the second run left him well short in the combined reckoning.

“The heel binding ripped right out of my left ski when I landed,” Mahre said. “It was weird, something that’s never happened to me before.”

Tom Kelly, a former assistant coach on the U.S. Ski Team now with the firm that supplies Mahre with bindings, was dumbfounded afterward. “I didn’t mount Phil’s bindings myself,” he said, “and I can’t really explain how it happened.”

But Kelly did a double-take when he opened a fortune cookie after eating the Oriental meal served in the hospitality tent. Said the fortune:

“You will soon be in another line of work.”

In the second round, Mahre had won a battle of 1984 Olympic gold medalists when he defeated Max Julen. Mahre, who took the slalom at Sarajevo, Yugoslavia, edged Julen, the 1984 giant slalom champion, by 0.149 of a second in the first run, then breezed into the quarterfinals as Julen fell near the end of their second duel.

Lindqvist appeared to be on a collision course to meet fellow Swede Jorgen Sundqvist in the semifinals. Last season, the first for both on the tour, Sundqvist was the overall champion, and Lindqvist was third, just behind Mahre.

However, Sundqvist fell on his second run in the quarterfinals against Joerg Seiler of Switzerland, who went on to give Lindqvist a scare before losing their semifinal by a slim combined time differential of 0.009 of a second.

Lindqvist had been eliminated in the second round Saturday as Bernhard Knauss of Austria won the giant slalom, but he said Sunday: “I wasn’t worried. Today was a new day.”

And besides, Knauss had to scratch from the slalom because of a partial ligament tear in his right knee and a partial separation of his left shoulder suffered in a finish-line spill the day before.