Third was a personal best result for Drake

British skier Ed Drake got his Winter Olympic season off to a great start with a podium finish in a European Cup super-G in Reiteralm, Austria.

It was Drake's best race result as he finished third behind Patrick Kueng and Philipp Schoerghofer.

"It's the first opportunity to race and to find out how training has gone. Third feels fantastic," he said.

European Cup is below World Cup level but a top three finish is equivalent to a top 20 result in the top tier.

British alpine coach Mike Pilarski was delighted with the performance of the 23-year-old, from Kingston in Surrey.

He said: "Ed skied well - his run was clean and technically good.

"There were a couple of key gates on the course which he handled well and that helped him over the flat sections".

However Drake, who has been suffering from a bug and missed some training, could not follow it up in a second race at the same venue, coming 20th.

606: DEBATE With the Winter Olympics less than 100 days away it bodes well for Ed Drake Anna T - BBC Sport

The World Cup season resumes at Levi in Finland this weekend with a slalom race, with Noel Baxter representing Britain.

Drake's next competition will be the World Cup downhill and super-G races at Lake Louise, in Canada, from 25-29 November.

He has already met the GB team's qualification criteria for the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, as have several others.

But, with Britain expecting to receive fewer quota places for Vancouver than the number of qualified athletes, Drake is expected to face a selection procedure in early 2010 to decide who will represent GB.

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