Mader Wins It, but Moe Makes Him Wait : World Cup skiing: Austrian doesn’t celebrate in super-giant slalom until results are official.

For an apparent winner, Guenther Mader seemed unusually restrained in the finish area of the World Cup super-giant slalom race Sunday.

“No, it’s not official yet,” he said as his Austrian teammates congratulated him. “We have to wait for Tommy Moe to ski yet.”

Moe, who came from the second group to place second in Saturday’s downhill, was even further down the starting list this time, in the fourth tier at No. 47, but Mader was taking no chances.

At the moment, a semblance of order had seemingly been restored to Alpine ski racing as the 28-year-old Mader held the lead with a time of 1 minute 20.66 seconds; downhill ace Franz Heinzer of Switzerland was second, 0.04 of a second behind, and another Austrian, 1992 Olympic downhill champion Patrick Ortlieb, was third, another half-second back.

Upstart Norway could manage no better than fifth with Atle Skaardal, who had won the downhill the day before.

Moe, 23, of Palmer, Alaska, again skied beyond his usual limits, but his all-out effort was only good enough for a 12th-place tie in 1:22.12. Still, Moe was the top American finisher, 0.12 ahead of AJ Kitt, who was 19th.

“I’m real happy,” Moe said, “because it was my best World Cup super-G result. Until now, I’d never been higher than 20th.”

Told about Mader’s comment, Moe laughed and said: “Really? I guess I’ve got some of the top dogs turning their necks now.”

Sunday’s No. 1 dog, Mader, said his victory was especially gratifying because it justified his change in training methods this season. After working out and traveling with the Austrian national team throughout his career, he decided last summer to return to the coach who had guided him since he was 7.

“His name is Robert Trenkwalder,” Mader said, “and he has given me the individual attention I needed to be even more successful. The only problem is that my sponsorship money still goes to the Austrian Ski Federation, so it is a very expensive way to train.”

Mader, however, pocketed the $7,000 check awarded to Sunday’s winner by the Whistler Mountain race organizers.

“I’ll probably celebrate a little tonight in Vancouver,” he said, “then fly to Colorado for next weekend’s races at Aspen. I would like to go to my condo in Palm Springs and play some golf, but there is not enough time. It will have to wait until spring.”

The world’s best all-around skier, Marc Girardelli of Luxembourg, didn’t earn any money here either, but he continued to widen his lead in the World Cup men’s overall chase, finishing sixth Sunday, just ahead of Norwegian Kjetil Andre Aamodt, who leaped over Italy’s Alberto Tomba into second place in the standings. With 11 races left, Girardelli has 1,149 points to 702 for Aamodt and 692 for Tomba.

Tomba, of course, does not enter either the downhill or the super-G.

“It was not really a good weekend,” Girardelli said, “but it was not too bad either. I finished ahead of Aamodt twice, and that helped. Those Norwegians have been too good lately.”