The 26-year-old Austrian, who has four World Championship gold medals, raced to a commanding win with an impressive victory margin of 1.29 sec.

He smoothly negotiated the challenging Face de Bellevard course which caused many skiers difficulties and clocked a winning time of 2 min 8.49 sec.

American Ted Ligety, the double Olympic champion who won the opening giant slalom race of the season in Sölden, Austria, failed to finish his second run while two of the last five skiers to go also crashed out.

France's Thomas Fanara, fourth after the first run, and Norway's Olympic bronze medallist Henrik Kristoffersen, who was second going into run two, both saw their podium chances disappear in spectacular fashion.

Their misfortune elevated German Felix Neureuther to second place while home skier Victor Muffat-Jeandet claimed another podium in third after finishing second behind Hirscher in Beaver Creek in the United States.

He was 1.58 behind the winner as the home crowd were given a top three finish to celebrate.

The Austrian, who also claimed a Super-G victory in Beaver Creek this season, now holds the Val d'Isere record with five total victories, four in the giant slalom and one in the slalom.

Last year's giant slalom and slalom World Cup winner continues to lead the men's overall standings ahead of Aksel Lund Svindal of Norway.

Ligety, however, is continuing to struggle after he also failed to finish in Beaver Creek.

Meanwhile, the women's World Cup season has also seen action today, in Åre, Sweden.

There was another familiar name on top of the podium as American Lindsey Vonn won her fourth World Cup race of the season by taking the giant slalom honours.

Vonn, the 31-year-old Vancouver 2010 downhill champion who won both downhills and the Super-G at the last World Cup leg in Lake Louise, Canada, recorded a total time of 2:04.70 to edge Austrian Eva-Maria Brem into second by a slender 0.07 sec.

Italian Federica Brignone was third, 0.35 behind Vonn, who maintains her overall World Cup lead ahead of compatriot Mikaela Shiffrin who has excelled in this year's slalom races but missed today's action after a warm-up crash.

The men's World Cup season continues in Val d'Isere tomorrow with the first slalom race of the season, while in Åre a slalom race is also scheduled for the women.



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December 2015: Svindal and Vonn dominate on downhill day at Alpine Skiing World Cup
November 2015: Shiffrin and Svindal ski to second wins at FIS World Cup
November 2015: Olympic champion bounces back from giant slalom disappointment with gold at Alpine Skiing World Cup