Shiffrin, 24, doesn’t have timeline on career length

With each passing year, it seems increasingly likely that if Mikaela Shiffrin remains healthy and motivated, she will obliterate every significant record in ski racing, including Ingemar Stenmark’s record of 86 World Cup wins.

She’s already No. 5 on the all-time list with 60, and she set the record for wins in a season last winter with 17. She has never had an injury requiring significant surgery.

But how long will she want to keep racing? Lindsey Vonn retired last winter at age 34 with 82 victories, but Shiffrin, 24, doubts she will want to take it that far.

“I don’t really have a timeline,” said Shiffrin, who embarks on her ninth World Cup season Saturday in Soelden, Austria. “I don’t know if I’m going to make it until I’m 30. I don’t see myself going well beyond 30.

“If I’m at that point and I’m still having an absolute blast, still reaching my own standards of skiing, I’ll keep going. But for sure, I think about that.”

Shiffrin, who moved from EagleVail to a new house of her own this year in nearby Edwards, said her motivation remains high despite her superiority.

“I’ve stated it so many times that my motivation doesn’t really come from breaking records,” she said. “Every year, everybody says, ‘Now what are you shooting for? What else is there to do?’ At this point it gets simpler and simpler every year. I’m still motivated to go to the gym all summer long and to do those things I have to do to be ready to ski as fast as I can. I still find so much joy from training, feeling my turns getting better and improving. As long as that’s there, I’m ready to keep going.”

Vonn fell just short of Stenmark’s record with 82 wins, and she had only 12 when she was Shiffrin’s age. Austria’s Marcel Hirscher, who was the dominant male racer in recent years, retired this summer with 67. If Shiffrin stays healthy, she seems almost certain to finish this season in third place with only Vonn and Stenmark left to beat.