Hannes Reichelt of Austria was second and overall World Cup leader Ivica Kostelic of Croatia was third.

Defending champion Didier Cuche of Switzerland missed the podium and finished fourth, while Olympic champion Aksel Lund Svindal of Norway failed to finish.

Bode Miller of the United States lost a pole early in a spectacular run and had to settle for 12th after slowing down at the bottom of the Kandahar course. But his run inspired Innerhofer.

“I saw Bode Miller and I told myself that’s how I had to race, too,” the Italian said. “Simply give your best, then you can’t reproach yourself at the finish.”

Innerhofer has only one World Cup victory to date — a downhill in Bormio in his native Italy in December 2008 — but he beat Reichelt by a massive .60 seconds, finishing in 1 minute, 38.31 seconds. Reichelt, who won the final super-G race before the worlds on Saturday, clocked 1:38.91. Kostelic finished in 1:39.03.

“These races come only once every two years so I knew I had to go all out today,” Innerhofer said. “You can’t make any sort of calculations. The course is incredible and exhausting but I managed to keep things under control.”

Although his World Cup career includes only three other third-place finishes, Innerhofer had indicated his potential by coming close to winning medals at the last two major events.

He missed the podium at the world championships two years ago by finishing .05 seconds behind bronze medalist Svindal. And he was sixth at the Winter Olympics last year, only .08 seconds away from the bronze.

Reichelt said he was surprised with his second-place finish.

“Normally, these are not my conditions,” Reichelt said. “I thought I’d skied a lousy race. The uneven, icy piste was extremely difficult, at some points it was really twilight. I got tired quickly and I could hardly stay upright at the end.”

Miller clipped a gate with his arm and lost a pole, but continued at fast pace and was nearly a full second ahead of the previous 10 racers before him. He lost his balance coming out of a bend at the bottom, however, slowed down and came across the line at a leisurely pace. He was still ahead of many top-ranked skiers in 12th place.

“I tried to push on the top but I hooked my arm pretty hard,” Miller said. “I made the recovery but then I lost my balance. I skied like I wanted on the top. But it’s a matter of finishing without making mistakes.”

Miller, who said skiing without the pole didn’t seem to make too much of a difference, would likely have broken into the top 10 if he had not stood up at the bottom.

“It was difficult. It was challenging. But that’s how it should be. It’s the world championships. It’s a pretty tame hill. It’s really basic,” Miller said. “But today it was bumpy enough and fast enough to make it challenging. You see a lot of guys having problems and if you see Innerhofer skiing, he really deserves to win here. He was one of the few guys really pushing and really taking some risk.”

Erik Guay of Canada, who won the super-G race and the World Cup title in the event on the same slope last year, also failed to finish.

Kostelic finished second to Guay in that race and surprised himself with another podium finish.

“Super-G is not really my event. But this slope seems good for me,” said Kostelic, who has had to overcome a series of injuries in his career. “I raced all out, but it’s a brutal course. It’s not very healthy for my knees and back.”