Alpine ski racer Piera Hudson has finished in 12th place in the Individual Parallel Giant Slalom at the FIS Ski World Championships in Italy.

This is a career-best result for Piera, who is originally from Hawkes Bay and has trained in Wanaka for many years.

"I couldn’t be happier starting my World Champs off with a 12th place in the GS Parallel finals,” Piera said. 

The race took place yesterday (Wednesday February 17).

“It was my first time racing this discipline as I had to miss the Lech World Cup earlier in the season so to qualify seventh in my course in the morning and move on to the finals was a really great feeling.”

Piera qualified through to the 1/8 finals with a seventh place result in her heat, an achievement in itself with only 16 women (eight from each heat) qualifying. 

She raced head-to-head against Tina Robnik (Slovakia) in the 1/8 finals but was +0.62 seconds behind her and did not advance to the quarter finals. 

Marta Bassino (Italy) continued her incredible season and tied for the gold medal with Katharina Liensberger (Austria) in the tight race. Tessa Worley (France) rounded out the podium in the bronze medal position.  

The FIS Alpine World Ski Championships are held once every two years. 

Snow Sports NZ head of alpine Jono Howson said the world champs is a stand-alone event and titles are held until the next FIS Alpine World Championships.  

Up next for the Kiwi team at the Alpine World Championships is the women’s Giant Slalom on Thursday (February 18) at 10pm NZT with Alice Robinson and Piera Hudson in the start gate. 

The world champs runs from February 8-21 in Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy.

See the full results list here.