Mikaela Shiffrin 4x Women's Slalom World Champion--Wow!

[geoffda]

Sitting 3rd after the first run, trailing by 0.15 seconds and fighting a chest cold, she found another gear and delivered a storming second run to win by 0.58 seconds over Swenn Larsson and 1.03 seconds over Vhlova. Leinsberger was the only other woman to finish within 2 seconds of Shiffrin, finishing 4th, 1.43 seconds back. Here is a link to the Eurosport feed for the video of her second run. https://www.eurosport.com/alpine-skiing/world-championships/2018-2019/alpine-skiing-world-championships-wendy-holdener-takes-slalom-top-spot-after-first-run-in-are_sto7146037/story.shtml. It was a run worthy of a true champion--she went straight at the gates and put it all on the line to come from behind and capture her fourth consecutive Slalom World Championship.

[jbotti]

We are definitely witnessing greatness. Barring injury she will likely go down as the greatest ski racer ever, the most dominant and the most versatile (winning regularly in all 5 events). And its clear that we have not even seen her best yet as she continues to improve in GS and the speed events.

Definitely a joy to watch every race.

[ErikCO]

When I watch her ski, especially in SL, what impresses me the most is how casual, for lack of a better word, her skiing looks. She goes down the course and doesn't make it look like she is working at it. The fact that there are gates she happens to be going around almost seems like an afterthought. And then she beats everyone else by huge margins. Many of the other skiers look like they are fighting to make a number of the gates.

[jbotti]

Just watched that Slalom race. Pretty brutal conditions with warm temps and break away snow. Shiffrin's 2nd run was amazing. Vhlova's 2nd run was equally impressive.

[jbotti]

As long as we are talking about great slalom runs, Hirscher's first run this morning was pretty much perfection. Kristofferson looked great in his first run before Hirscher and Hirscher came down after him and bested it by 1.7 seconds. Unreal. Hirscher not only took the straightest line but he skied it cleaner than guys who took a less direct line. I think it was as close to perfection as I have seen.

[Max_501]

Vid of Hirscher's incredible run here:

https://au.eurosport.com/alpine-skiing/ ... tory.shtml

[h.harb]

Yes, John, I saw the same thing best slalom run of the year. Stefano Gross's run 2 years ago he won by 2 seconds was amazing also.

[SkiMoose]

Gross's skiing is beautiful. I love his narrower stance, and his ability to carve clean arcs is amazing. I don't know why he can't win more, it seems like textbook PMTS skiing.

[jbotti]

Here are some crazy numbers from Mikaela's season this year. Unreal!!

2018-19 Season Accolades

First super-G win in Lake Louise, making ski racing history by becoming the first-ever athlete – male or female – to win in all six currently contested FIS Ski World Cup alpine disciplines.

She’s won every super-G she’s entered this season – three World Cup victories (Lake Louise, St. Moritz and Cortina), and one World Championship victory (Are)

First ski racer – male or female – to win 15 World Cup races in a calendar year (2018)

Women’s slalom World Cup win record (38 – second only to Ingemar Stenmark with 40 – and could match Stenmark, as she has two slalom starts left on the season)

Fifth on the all-time World Cup win list (57 – Austrian great Annemarie Moser-Proell is fourth, with 62 victories)

14 World Cup victories on the season (so far) – tied with Vreni Schneider’s record for wins in a single season (she has at least four more chances this season)

2019 Super-G World Champion

2019 Slalom World Champion – first athlete – male or female – to win four successive world titles in a discipline (quite a heroic win, as she did it while she was ill with a chest infection)

2019 giant slalom bronze medalist

Locked in the slalom title already for the season, with her last victory at the City Event in Stockholm – 2019 slalom title holder (sixth in seven years – only year missing was 2016, when she was injured – and she was still fourth in the standings)

Current overall, super-G, and giant slalom standings leader

This is something that’s pretty impressive…

Worlds – Gold Medal Count

Norway 2

Switzerland 2

Mikaela 2

Austria 1

This is Mikaela’s winning and podium percentage on the season:

24 races, with 20 podiums (including 2019 World Champs giant slalom bronze), 16 of which were wins (including 2019 World Champs super-G and slalom victories). There’s an 83% chance Mikaela will podium a race she enters this season, and a 67% chance she’ll win. Across six disciplines: slalom, parallel slalom, giant slalom, alpine combined, super-G and downhill.

[jbotti]

After yesterday and today's victories in Slalom and GS, Mikaela won 17 races in the 18-19 WC season (not counting the 2 races she won at the Worlds). Winning 19 races in a season is just UNREAL!! She won her third overall title and joined a very short list of skiers that have won 4 globes in a season (she won the overall, slalom, GS and SG globes this season). Staying healthy and avoiding injury will be the only thing that separates her from obliterating every record out there for victories and globes.

And on that note, according to HH who has listened to some recent interviews with Hirscher in German, he (Hirscher) apparently is quite concerned about injury going forward and it appears to be one of the factors which will influence his decision to continue racing or to possibly retire which he continues to hint about. I say more power to him. We all have watched as Lindsey Vonn has done permanent damage to her body and we all hope she can walk at 60. Hirscher has zero left to prove in this sport. He has utterly dominated in a way that only Stenmark did and he has done it all graciously. Of course I would love to see him continue racing and to get 87+ victories but I can only imagine the pressure he feels and how hard he works 365 days a year to ski at the level that he does. Another part of me hopes he goes out on top and walks away with a huge smile on his face!

[blackthorn]

Here is an interesting post from Brandon Dyksterhouse that he put on Mikaela's facebook page.
For those of you that don't know who Brandon is, he was one of her former coaches who was great at analyzing her style.

Brandon Dyksterhouse - While it is virtually impossible to always be on top, you make it look easy! Every once in a blue moon you need to blame the equipment and today is one of those days. Same problem, different day... if you can't push the skis they don't bend. Tell the A-Team to build you a pair that actually works in these conditions.

This is an extract from a recent post on Michaela Shiffrin over on P*gsk* referencing her recent poor result in Courchevel GS.

What does Brandon Dyksterhouse mean when he says " if you can't push the skis they don't bend". This is not what I understand to be WC racing technique nor PMTS.

Anyway, great to see her last two results, and of course, a top ten GS finish for the kiwi, Alice Robinson in GS.

[mborsik]

So, what's happened to her recently? After dominating by 2+ seconds in the beginning of the season, she does 4 mediocre runs in Zagreb and in Flachau. Did Atomic screw up the setup again?

[HeluvaSkier]

Perhaps speed events are a distraction or she feels unprepared. She’s one of the most rehearsed athletes on the WC and also one of the biggest head cases (vomiting at the start, etc.). If she’s not feeling ready, that horse won’t run. She can win the overall without competing in speed... unsure why they are pushing her as a four event skier. Sure she CAN win everywhere but SHOULD she? Hirscher did it right... crush tech events, snipe a few SGs here and there, retire on top and healthy at 30 without risking his body in speed events. Schiffrin is way too talented and dominant in tech to be risking speed events where a bad crash could be career ending.

[jbotti]

I could not agree more!!