Marco Odermatt missed out on winning every World Cup giant slalom in a season when he skied out late on in his second run while leading in Saalbach-Hinterglemm, gifting victory to compatriot Loic Meillard on Saturday.
Swiss star Odermatt had already long wrapped up a third straight overall title and third straight discipline globe but was looking to win all 10 giant slaloms this season and extend his winning record in the discipline to 13 straight races.
But it appeared he pushed too hard and missed a gate to the shock of the Austrian crowd.
"The mistake is unnecessary...I wanted to accelerate on the inside ski," Odermatt said.
"It's always a shame to end the season with negative emotions when there are nine good reasons for positive emotions. The other nine races were perfect."
It has still been a stunning season for Odermatt, who also triumphed in two downhills and two super-gs and can add to his tally of 13 season wins as the Finals conclude over the coming days.
Meillard won with a combined time of 2 minutes 36.27 seconds for his second victory of the season and fourth overall to edge out Andorra's Joan Verdu and Switzerland's Thomas Tumler.
The Swiss skier joked: "I am very pleased. Of course it's a shame for Marco. But it was about time he let us win one."
In the women's slalom at the same venue, American great Mikaela Shiffrin wrapped up her season with a record-extending 97th World Cup victory.
It was her ninth win of the season and seventh in slalom, where she had already claimed her eighth discipline title.
The 29-year-old was second after the first run behind Anna Swenn Larsson but a mistake by the Swede halfway down her second leg gave Shiffrin victory by 0.54 from Norway's Mina Fuerst Holtmann, with Swenn Larsson only third.
Shiffrin had a mathematical chance to claim a sixth overall title but has opted out of any further events given she lacks practice in the quicker disciplines following a bad crash in the Cortina downhill in January, which caused her to miss several races having led overall.
Now the fight for World Cup glory will be between Swiss skier Lara Gut-Behrami and Italy's Federica Brignone, who is 282 points behind.
Neither raced in the slalom but go for the giant slalom title in Austria on Sunday, with Gut-Behrami also leading the super-g and downhill standings as well.
