Italy's Marta Bassino claimed the women's World Cup crystal globe in giant slalom on Sunday at the end of a weekend of races where home advantage benefitted the likes of Austria's Vincent Kriechmayr and Slovakia's Petra Vlhova.

Bassino, 25, failed to make it onto the podium in the giant slalom in Jasna, Slovakia, but her dominance at the beginning of the season – where she won four of the first five races in the discipline – ensured her unassailable point lead two weeks before season's end, with 510 points ahead of France's Tessa Worley with 362. 

Read more: Freshly crowned ski world champ Gut-Behrami nabs super-G globe

The Italian, fresh from a parallel gold medal at world championships three weeks ago, finished fourth on Sunday as home favorite Vlhova claimed victory ahead of New Zealand's Alice Robinson and Mikaela Shiffrin of the U.S.

Vlhova's win, as well as her second place in Saturday's slalom, ensured crucial points as she remains neck and neck with Switzerland's Lara Gut-Behrami for the overall World Cup crystal globe. The Swiss is currently in the lead with 1,256 points, with her rival 36 points behind.

Vlhova, 25, also leads in the slalom standings but Shiffrin – who put in another top performance on Saturday to win ahead of Vlhova and Wendy Holdener of Switzerland in third – is breathing down the Slovakian's neck. Vlhova was last season's slalom trophy winner and is the vice world champion, but Shiffrin has six globes to her name in that discipline along with Olympic gold and three world titles, and there are three more slaloms to go before the end of the season.

Tight race for men's trophies

On the men's side, the weekend's program got off to a rough start when fog and heavy snowfall forced the cancellation, after nine racers had already gone down the course, of Friday's downhill in Saalbach-Hinterglemm, Austria.

This season's races have repeatedly been disrupted by weather as well as the COVID-19 pandemic, and Saalbach was already standing in for races initially scheduled in Kvitfjell, Norway and Wengen, Switzerland.

Austria's current speed king Kriechmayr kept his cool however on Saturday and tore down the hill to claim his fourth straight speed victory – which include two gold medals at world championships in Cortina d'Ampezzo – defeating Swiss turbo Beat Feuz and fellow Austrian Matthias Mayer.

As with Vlhova, racing on home snow appeared to give Kriechmayr wings as he scored two podiums in two days.

However, it was Switzerland's Marco Odermatt who crushed the competition in Sunday's super-G, beating France's Matthieu Bailet – who earned his very first World Cup podium – and Kriechmayr in third.

Odermatt thereby narrowed the gap between himself and overall World Cup leader Alexis Pinturault to just 81 points, putting the Swiss well within range of his first major trophy.

Both Kriechmayr and Feuz meanwhile missed their chance to clinch the super-G and downhill globes early this weekend, ensuring the race for crystal globes will go down to the wire at World Cup finals in Lenzerheide, Switzerland on March 15-21.

Feuz has 68 points on Mayer in the downhill standings, while Kriechmayr has an 83-point lead on Odermatt in the super-G. Both disciplines have just one more race scheduled in Lenzerheide.