Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
For re-energized Shiffrin, history awaits on the hills
PYEONGCHANG, South Korea — As 2017 turned into 2018, Mikaela Shiffrin bounced around Europe, giving her passport a workout and picking up more hardware for the trophy case back home.
In a 21⁄2-week stretch, she skied — and won — in France, Austria, Norway, Croatia and Slovenia.
“We had a ton of races all back to back,” Shiffrin said. “I was rested and had great training, great preparation. So I was able to carry my momentum into that stretch.”
At all those stops, she raced beautifully. She reached the podium 11 straight times, including nine first-place finishes and an unheard-of five victories in a row. “Then after that,” she said, “I got tired.” As the Olympics crept closer, Shiffrin’s results began to suffer. Since that string of podium appearance, she’s had five races, finishing no higher than seventh.
At a time when she’d prefer to be peaking, Shiffrin, 22, instead invited uncertainty on the final leg of her journey to the Winter Olympics, where she has history in her sights.
After nine days of training and acclimating in South Korea, she looked rested and eager Saturday to prove she’s the skier who was unbeatable a month earlier — not the one who struggled just two weeks ago. “I feel much, much better now,” she said. Her position is unique. Her talent invites internal and external pressure. Her best stretch of the season was also a grueling one, and the demands caught up with her.
Shiffrin arrived in Pyeongchang a week and a half before her first race, training and resting in equal amounts. Her first race, barring weather delays, will be Monday’s giant slalom. Two days later she’ll aim to defend her Olympic slalom title. She’ll be a heavy favorite in both.
She’s not ready to commit to the rest of her Olympic schedule. If she feels good about her first two races, she hopes the momentum carries her into the speed events, when she could race the combined, downhill and maybe even the super-G.
If she’s feeling good mentally and physically, Shiffrin is a threat to medal almost every time she enters the starting gate. She has at least one World Cup win in four disciplines — slalom, giant slalom, downhill and combined — and finished fourth once last season in the super-G.
Only one female skier has ever won as many as three gold medals at a single Olympics — Croatia’s Janica Kostelic in 2002. The possibility of taking home multiple medals has prompted some to consider Shiffrin the Winter Games’ version of swimmer Michael Phelps.
”I can never even imagine myself in the same sentence as Michael Phelps,” she said. “That’s extremely flattering, but it’s apples and oranges.”
At the very least, she’s clearly the best female Alpine skier in the world right now and already has 41 World Cup victories, including 10 this season. Shiffrin has a chance these next two weeks to carve her name in Olympic lore.
“I don’t think anybody questions her dominance or her ability,” NBC analyst Bode Miller said. “If she’s at her best, there’s nobody even close right now.”