World Cup ski racing returns next Saturday at Soelden, Austria for the 2024-25 season and with it so does Vail Valley ski-racing star Mikaela Shiffrin.
But this season is going to rather different for her as Shiffrin will not be racing any downhill discipline events in the upcoming World Cup season — a bit of a shocker seeing she was touting interest in racing more speed disciplines last season.
Her reasoning:
“When I was talking with my team last year, they were like, look, we are trying, but it’s sort of physically impossible for you to get the preparation to be in winning shape in every event,” Shiffrin said from the Atomic Media Day Oct. 10 in Bergheim, Austria.
In 2024-25, however, Shiffrin’s ski racing fans will still get to watch her in the tech races, and locally in the Super-G at Beaver Creek in December.
“No downhill, not this season. I would love to bring it back, but we’ll see how it goes,” she said.
Shiffrin said of not racing in all four disciplines that weather patterns play a part in traveling to and from race sites along with different training schedules for tech races (Giant Slalom and Slalom) compared to speed races (Super-G and Downhill), which not always are at the same location.
Shiffrin stands at 97 World Cup wins in her career and should be able to eclipse 100 wins this season.
In an interview with the Associated Press, Shiffrin said: “I don’t personally care about winning 100, but I do think it’s a monumental moment in the sport.”
Shiffrin said she’d like to seize the opportunity to promote the sport more than she felt she was doing when breaking Stenmark’s best mark. She’s always a heavy favorite in the tech races of Slalom and Giant Slalom, and will compete in some Super-G races when the new campaign gets underway Saturday.
Shiffrin won nine races last season, even when missing six weeks of racing.
She’s also coming off an injury in January that left on an impression on her not only physically, but emotionally too.
As reported by the Associated Press, Shiffrin sprained the MCL and tibiofibular ligament in her left knee during a full-speed crash into the safety nets on the 2026 Olympic course in Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy.
She was among several women ski racers to crash hard during a loaded ski-racing January program. Her fiancé Aleksander Aamodt Kilde, also crashed and was injured severely on the men’s series.
Kilde had surgery to repair a severe cut and nerve damage in his right calf, plus two torn ligaments in his right shoulder after his crash near the finish of the downhill in Wengen, Switzerland, two weeks before Shiffrin’s mishap.
Speaking to the AP, the couple said during their recovery processes they contemplated retirement.
“We’ve had that conversation. We’ve both had moments where we were like: ‘I’m so tired of it, it’s time,’” Shiffrin said. “I’m assuming there’s a shift in the mentality from a moment of doubt to like between moments of motivation to more doubt and less motivation. And right now, I’m still pretty much always motivated. But there’s challenges that we face. And his injury… it took a while for him to say he wanted to come back.”
Shiffrin did return and won two slalom races close to last season’s end, however, Kilde suffered a setback in his recovery as his shoulder needed additional surgery over the summer.
Moving forward into this season, Shiffrin prepped and trained with the U.S. Ski Team in Chile and worked out more in the gym to rebuild her strength.
Mikaela Shiffrin training in Chile for World Cup 2024-25 season
She’ll more than likely benefit with the additional training seeing that the first 10 races of the season are all technical events.
But Shiffrin could also eclipse 100 wins even before the Super-G speed schedule starts mid-December in Beaver Creek in her native Colorado.
Shiffrin has also never won an over World Cup globe in the downhill discipline race and it sounds like she will not be winning one during the 2024-25 season either.
When Shiffrin nears 100 wins, however, she and her team have already been working on ideas to make it more meaningful.
“I get so much from the sport, anyway, and I have been the whole time, whether I get 99 races or a 100 or a 105 or whatever,” Shiffrin said. “I’ve still gotten so much from the sport and to be honest, the fact that I’m still doing it feels selfish because what else is there to get? But I still want to be doing it.”
How great would it be for Shiffrin to claim win 100 at Beaver Creek in front of the hometown fans in December?
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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