Ligety 'really surprised' by giant slalom dud

Ted Ligety's defense of his Olympic giant slalom gold medal has ended with a 15th-place finish behind Austrian Marcel Hirscher.

Ligety knew he hadn't turned in the best opening run, but what he couldn't tell as he was heading down the hill was just how poorly he'd done.

The American says he was ''really surprised'' when he saw his time.

He says, ''It didn't feel like I crushed it,'' before adding with a chuckle: ''But it didn't feel 2+ seconds bad.''

Ligety lost more ground to Hirscher in the second leg Sunday and ended up tied for 15th place, 3.21 seconds slower than the winning time of 2 minutes, 18.04 seconds.

Ligety says it was ''a really bad day and time to not ski up to the level I wanted to.''