Fans ready to cheer Shiffrin’s success
By Polly Mikula
Mikaela Shiffrin, who attended Burke Mountain Academy in Vermont, has won the Slalom race at Killington six of seven times since the Killington Cup began in 2016. Fans always want to see her defend her title but this year that victory could bring with it another massive milestone: her 100th World Cup win! A feat no other Alpine skier in history has done. She began the season with 97 World Cup wins and there are three races before the Killington Cup — one Giant Slalom and two Slalom races, she won both Slaloms setting her up to possibly win her 100th at Killington.
After her 62 World Cup Slalom win last Saturday, Nov. 23 Shiffrin shared with Olympics.com. “I was really nervous on the top… It feels really satisfying to have a great run down this slope. What a wonderful day today.”
While the competition is always steep, with less than a quarter second often separating places on the podium, Shiffrin has proven her podium prowess over and over in the 14 years she’s been on the World Cup circuit. She has a 35.92% World Cup winning rate from 270 starts, according to Olympics.com. Of her 99 wins, she’s won 62 Slalom World Cup events and 22 Giant Slalom events. Her podium rate is even higher at 56.29% with 152 World Cup podiums (84 in Slalom).
While Shiffrin has been most prominent in Slalom, she is a contender in Giant Slalom as well having won 22 World Cup Giant Slalom races and made the podium 43 times total in that event. She also won the overall globe in Giant Slalom for the World Cup season in 2022-23.
The Giant Slalom in Killington will be the second race of the season in that discipline. The first was the season opener in Soelden, Austria on Oct. 26 where Shiffrin placed fifth.
Shiffrin has podiumed twice in Giant Slalom at Killington: in 2019 she placed third and in 2017, second.
Records set
In January 2023, Shiffrin broke the women’s record of 82 World Cup wins held by Lindsey Vonn (2018), then two months later she broke the men’s record of 86 accumulated by Swede Ingemar Stenmark in the 1980s. She started this season with 97 after she tacked on nine more wins last season.
Shiffrin is tied with Stenmark and Lindsey Vonn for most season titles in a single discipline, with eight, and her 62 total World Cup Slalom wins are the most by any skier in a single discipline. (In addition to her 62 Slalom and 22 Giant Slalom wins, she has 5 wins in Super-G, 4 in Downhill, 3 City Events, 2 Parallel Slaloms, 1 Alpine Combined — and while this sounds a bit like “The 12 days of Christmas” I assure you those stats are accurate!). Shiffrin is the first athlete to win a race in six different Alpine disciplines.
In total Shiffrin has stood on the World Cup podium 154 times (86 in Slalom, 43 in Giant Slalom, 10 in Super-G, 7 in Downhill, 5 in City Events, 2 in Parallel Slalom and 1 in Alpine Combined), which is now just one shy of that podium record held by Sweidsh legend Ingemar Stenmark.
In one season (2018-19) she accumulated 17 wins, which is the most by any skier, male or female, in a single season.
She has also won the Overall season title five times (2017, 2018, 2019, 2022, 2023), which is one shy of the female record set by Austrian Annemarie Moser-Pröll in the 1970s — a record she may tie this year. (The overall title is determined by adding points from results in all 37 World Cup races across Downhill, Super-G, Giant Slalom and Slalom. While Shiffrin has chosen to bow out of Downhill races this season, she’s still the heavy favorite.)
In total, she’s won 15 World Cup Season titles (5 overall, 7 Slalom, 1 Super-G, 2 Giant Slalom); seven World Championship titles (4 Slalom, 1 Super G, 1 in Giant Slalom, and 1 Alpine Combined); and 3 Olympic medals (Gold in Slalom 2014, Gold in Giant Slalom 2018 and Silver in Alpine Combined 2018).
Last season, Shiffrin was sidelined for an 11-race stretch after a crash in a Downhill event in late January at Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy, when she sprained left leg ligaments. Shiffrin returned in March and won her last two races, both Slaloms, and still won the Slalom season and finished third in the overall standings.
The first seven races this season are all technical events — Giant Slalom and Slalom — Shiffrin’s best. Of the 37 World Cup races this season, 10 are in Slalom, 10 Giant Slalom, 9 Super-G and 8 Downhill.
Shiffrin is simply the greatest of all time (GOAT).
