AFP - Swiss veteran Didier Cuche overcame the gruelling Bellevarde course to claim gold in the men's Super-G at the World Ski Championships here on Wednesday.

Cuche, wearing bib number 16, clocked 1min 19.41sec, a staggering 0.99sec ahead of Italian silver medallist Peter Fill, with Norway's Aksel Lund Svindal a further 0.03sec adrift in third winning the bronze.

The 34-year-old, a Super-G silver medallist in the 1998 Nagano Olympic Games and a giant slalom bronze medallist at the 2007 worlds, called on all his experience to master an unforgiving, icy course.

Cuche won the testing Hahnnenkamm downhill race in Kitzbuehel last month and topped the World Cup downhill standings for the last two seasons.

This season's World Cup Super-G leader Benjamin Raich of Austria finished in fifth, 1.15sec off the pace, while American Bode Miller could only manage 12th, 2.43sec down on Cuche's time.

"It was a steep icy pitch," said Miller, who decried that fact that that had made it more a tactical battle rather than one of speed.

"There was not a whole lot of attack out there. There was a lot of slide on the turns to slow down.

"It's tough to see that at a World Championships and be such a decisive factor. It should be everyone skiing at the maximum of their ability and see who wins."

Overall World Cup leader Ivica Kostelic of Croatia did not start because of a back injury, and Austrian Super-G specialist Herman Maier was almost three seconds adrift of the winner.

There were a number of casualties on the famed "Face de Bellevarde", a 1,770-metre-long black run that offers no mercy to the racer with a 650-metre drop from start to finish, almost entirely visible from the centre of the village.

Apart from two gates that take skiers across the slope four seconds after the start, the remainder of the slope is punishingly steep, known locally as "Le Mur," or the wall.

American Ted Ligety suffered a spectacular crash after one tight turn on the wall, losing a ski and catherine-wheeling 200 metres down the slope before coming to a halt in the side netting.