Even without skiing superstar Hermann Maier, the Austrian men's speed team showed its depth Sunday as Fritz Strobl won the Olympic men's downhill and World Cup season downhill champion Stephan Eberharter placed 3rd.

Austria had three racers in the top six and all four Austrian starters finished in the top 20. The Americans, meanwhile, could do no better than Marco Sullivan's 9th-place finish. Three days after finishing 3rd in training, American favorite Daron Rahlves struggled to a 16th-place finish.

Starting ninth in a field of 55 racers, Eberharter had a solid run of 1 minute, 39.41 seconds, temporarily taking the lead. But Strobl, the next racer out of the gate, was flawless, finishing in 1:39.13 for his first medal of the Olympic Winter Games.

"I never thought about Olympic Games or medals or anything like that. I simply took it one step at a time," Strobl said. "Only in the last year, since Japan, actually I realized that I could win medals and bring them back home. But of course, in Austria skiing's a very popular sport, and this is a very nice thing to be able to return home with a medal." Strobl finished 11th in the 1998 Nagano downhill.

This season he won a World Cup in Bormio, Italy, and a super G in Garmisch, Germany. He is also a two-time winner of the World Cup downhill, called thr Hahnenkamm, at Kitzbuehel, Austria, considered the toughest downhill race in the world. He is the first Austria Olympic men's downhill champion since Patrick Ortlieb in 1992.

"Basically, the downhill run is always technically difficult," Strobl said. "I don't feel as if I skied aggressively at all. As a matter of fact, I skied with a lot of feeling. If you want to win you have to risk something, and I did risk something today and I got lucky too."

Norway's Lasse Kjus took the silver medal with a time of 1:39.35, continuing his tradition of performing well in major events. Kjus entered Sunday's race with three Olympic medals and 10 World Championships medals, second-most in a career behind Norwegian teammate Kjetil Andre Aamodt (15 world and Olympic medals). Aamodt finished 4th and Claude Cretier of France was 5th.

While Rahlves had a disappointing finish for the Americans, teammate Sullivan offered one of the day's biggest surprises, reaching the top 10 with a time of 1:40.37 after starting 31st in the field.

"It was sweet," Sullivan said. "I knew I had a decent run. I didn't really know what to expect for time just because the competition is so fast, so I wasn't really sure where I'd be sitting. But from the roar of the crowd, I knew it was something good."

Rahlves is regrouping for his next shot at a medal and Snowbasin's Grizzly race course next Saturday, Feb. 16.

"With the super G coming up next week, I've got another shot, and I'm looking forward to that race now," he said. "It's going to be tough, a good challenge. But it's a good hill for me. It fits my style. I like courses like this. I really don't feel like I was off my game today. I'm lucky to have one more race and we'll see what happens there."

— Scott Willoughby, MountainZone.com Correspondent