Mikaela Shiffrin Makes Sporting History
12th January 2022
Victory in the World Cup at Schladming gave the American a record-breaking 47th slalom win. NEW
Shiffrin picked up her 4th gold medal of the season in the first women’s International Ski Federation World Cup event to be held at the Austrian resort in 10 years.
It means she overtakes the brilliant Swede, Ingemar Stenmark, who had 46 slalom wins in his career.
Shiffrin was only 5th after the first run of the night race but took the victory to deny her main rival Petra Vlhová of Slovakia.
She has also increased her lead at the top of the overall World Cup standings.
After 20 events out of a total 37, Shiffrin currently has 966 points with Vlhová close behind on 911.
Vlhová has, however, secured the overall slalom title and the Crystal Globe.
In the same race, GB’s Charlie Guest achieved her career best of 13th.
Shiffrin posted her reaction to the race on social media.
She made reference to her father, Jeff, who died suddenly two years ago.
It was Shiffrin’s first victory since she tested positive for Covid-19 at the end of December and was forced to miss a World Cup slalom and giant slalom in Lienz, Austria.
Since coming back from isolation, Shiffrin has twice been on the podium.
She was 2nd in the night slalom in Zagreb on 4th January.
In the Kranjska Gora slalom on 9th January, she recorded a rare DNF (did not finish) on the second run.
The victory in Schladming marked Shiffrin’s 73rd career World Cup victory.
Only Lindsey Vonn of the USA (82 wins) and Ingemar Stenmark of Sweden (86 wins) have more career wins.
Mikaela Shiffrin is, without question, one of the all-time greats and she is still only 26.
She has plenty of time left to catch up with those ski racing legends.
The next World Cup competitions for the women are the downhill and Super-G in Zauchensee, Austria, on 15th and 16th January.
