Skier Mikaela Shiffrin is back on top and heading to the Olympics
On Thursday afternoon, about a month after the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics, Mikaela Shiffrin was still a little out of breath over slalom training in Austria. But it was good, and not just because Shiffrin, an eight-time Olympic and world champion, is once again at the top of the Alpine-style World Cup standings.
“I finally feel like myself again,” she said in a phone interview.
Ten weeks ago, sitting in the kitchen of her Colorado home, Shiffrin almost announced she would return after nearly two years of mourning the untimely death of her father, a series of severe injuries and uneven results (by her record standards). She was also annoyed that some in the ski racing community had already started writing her off.
“For example, serious people, how quickly do you forget?” she said and her voice rose. “When a devastating thing happens, it’s like coming back after a serious injury. I didn’t lose my ability or my fire, I just healed, OK?
As the 26-year-old Shiffrin prepares for the Beijing Games, she has spent a competitive season quite different from those before her appearance at the 2014 Sochi Olympics, when she became the youngest slalom gold medalist, or at the Olympic Games. games in Pyeongchang in 2018 when she won. gold and silver medals. For example, last week she spent nine days in quarantine in Central Europe due to a positive coronavirus test – “mostly sitting or lying in a room,” she said – and was banned from any exercise that would raise her heart rate or breathing rate. . Since she didn’t go out, she carefully bent the two fitness straps and gently lifted the kettlebell.
Then, on Tuesday, the day after she was allowed to return to the World Cup, she was at the start of a long, challenging slalom in Zagreb, Croatia, wondering, “If I stopped halfway to rest, someone would had against? ? “
Get ready for the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics
Just a few months after Tokyo, the Olympic Games will start again in Beijing on February 4.
Shiffrin finished second behind her main rival Petra Vlhova, but beat Vlhova and almost the entire field in the second run. It was the kind of final run that was a characteristic of Shiffrin – until last season, when she unusually lost some of her advantage in the first run in the middle of the races.
On Thursday, Shiffrin admitted that there has been a noticeable shift in her performances this season. That’s part of what she means when she says she feels like herself again. At last year’s Zagreb race, for example, Shiffrin said she was distracted and sad during the rides, which often happened after her father’s death on February 2, 2020.
“It was like someone stabbed me in the chest all day of the race,” she said. “I sat apart from everyone and I remember thinking they probably think I’m so sad right now because I’m not winning, but I don’t want to be racing here at all.”
Shiffrin started visiting a sports psychologist last summer and said it is now easier to share her emotions and refocus on skiing when training or competing.
“For some time now, I have been able to refocus my mental and emotional energy on skiing and that has been very important,” she said. “Because it’s a skill I’ve been able to do all my career. So it came back very well and made a big difference. “
This season, Shiffrin, whose 72 World Cup victories are just 14 less than Ingemar Stenmark’s 86-year career record, has also done something that some of her colleagues may argue, namely racing in all World Cup disciplines – slalom, giant slalom , super- G and downhill. In addition to being one of the biggest stories of the Beijing Alpine Olympics, he still hopes to maintain his pre-season goal of racing in all five events there, an even rarer feat Shiffrin has yet to achieve. The fifth Alpine Olympic event is a combination of times from one slalom and one downhill.
Entering every event at the 2022 Games could have historical consequences. If the Olympics were to take place this weekend, Shiffra would be a serious candidate for four medals. Croatia’s Janica Kostelic has three record holders for the most medals at one of the Olympic Games. Kostelic and Anja Paerson from Sweden have an Olympic record for the most medals in their careers with six. Shiffrin already has three Olympic medals, two of them gold. No American skier, male or female, has won more than two Olympic gold medals.
Shiffrin, whose World Cup season continues this weekend with two races in Slovenia, said on Thursday that there is only one uncertainty when entering the five Olympic events.
“The descent is kind of in the air,” she said. “But we can’t really figure that out until we get there and do some training and see what my speed is on this track. That will be a decision during the match. “
Eileen Shiffrin, Mikaela’s mom and trainer, added an important caveat.
“Mikaela would be happy to do that and I’m excited about it,” she said of the five-event schedule. “But it comes with a star because all men’s and women’s races are crammed into two weeks. If you have delayed races, which often happens, your plans can be easily derailed. “
Shiffrin was preparing to drive from Austria to Slovenia on Friday. The pulse of the four-year Olympic cycle was loudest in the last month before the Games, but Shiffrin also found optimism in her diagnosis of Covid-19. Her recovery could reduce the likelihood of being positive for the virus during games.
“Honestly, I should be one of the safest people now,” she said with a laugh. “But I’m not taking any chances. I wore my mask everywhere. Just like everywhere. “