Emerging Shiffrin poised for run on Vonn’s records
COURCHEVEL, France — There appears little to prevent Mikaela Shiffrin taking over from Lindsey Vonn as the unstoppable force in women’s ski racing.
Shiffrin has a huge lead in defense of her overall World Cup title and her four wins this season have been in different disciplines. The 22-year-old American is branching out, and feeling confident about it. And with the Olympic Games coming up, that’s very bad news for her rivals.
Her downhill win at Lake Louise in early December was a personal breakthrough and sent out a statement: The Olympic and three-time world slalom champion, who has a few wins in giant slalom races, no longer views herself as just a technical specialist.
Her two wins at the French Alpine resort of Courchevel this week — in GS and the inaugural parallel slalom — took her to 35 World Cup wins.
Vonn is the women’s all-time record-holder with 78. The undisputed star for so many years, Vonn also has four overall World Cup titles and doubtless would have had more if not for serious knee injuries.
She is far from finished. The 33-year-old American came back with a super-G win at Val d’Isere on Saturday — her first win on the circuit since January.
But considering Shiffrin is so much younger, and has an expanding repertoire, she is well positioned to become a recordbreaker. The number of wins Shiffrin could get is potentially staggering.
When asked if she can beat Vonn’s mark, Shiffrin takes a long and thoughtful pause.
“If I’m feeling crazy I can think, yeah, maybe if I keep going this way I could get 78 or something. I could get there,” she told the AP after Tuesday’s GS win in Courchevel.
She could race Vonn in downhill at the Pyeongchang Olympics in February.
Injury-hit Vonn missed the 2014 Games and is intensely motivated to reclaim the downhill title she won at the 2010 Games.
Facing Vonn in downhill would be a treat for U.S. fans — and somewhat like Shiffrin agreeing to fight Vonn in her own backyard. It might be too good to refuse.
“I hadn’t been planning on doing the downhill. For sure, after Lake Louise I’m considering it more,” Shiffrin said. “It’s cool that the tech [slalom and GS] races are first, so that makes me feel more comfortable with doing the speed races.”