Featured Image: Mikaela Shiffrin racing the downhill in the 2023 St. Moritz World Cup race. Credit: GEPA

Mikaela Shiffrin, Stifel U.S. Ski Team athlete, released updates for this upcoming 2024/25 season with a slightly different direction. This season Shiffrin will be focusing on three disciplines: slalom, giant slalom, and super-G. She does not plan to enter into any World Cup downhills. 

Last week at the Atomic Media Day, she shared her reasoning for not pursuing all disciplines. Shiffrin highlighted the challenges of managing training for all four and the extensive preparation required to compete at the highest level in each event.

She stated, “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.” 

“With the weather patterns the way they have been lately, it’s really unpredictable and really hard to plan where to go, and you normally aren’t training at the same places for tech (GS and slalom) as you are for speed (downhill and super-G), so you’re sacrificing something always,” she continued.

Shiffrin’s Transition into World Cup Speed Events

Shiffrin began racing World Cups in 2011 and primarily focused on tech events, where she showed dominance in slalom and giant slalom. During her inaugural World Cup season, she achieved her first top-10 on the World Cup circuit in slalom in Aspen, Colorado. 

In the 2013 season, she won her first World Cup Globe in slalom, accumulating 688 points that season in the event. 

She decided to expand outside of technical disciplines in the 2015 season, where she kicked out of her first super-G and downhill World Cup starts. 

In 2015 she achieved her first top-15 in super-G in Lake Louise, and the next year she achieved her first top-15 in downhill in the same place. 

Although she podiumed in seven World Cup downhill races, including four victories, downhill is the only event out of the four that she has not won an overall World Cup Globe in. 

Last Season 

Before the 2023/24 season, Shiffrin was able to take advantage of solid downhill training, which showed in the first downhill event in St. Moritz. She won on December 9th, reigning victory over the two Italians, Sofia Goggia (+0.15) and Federica Brignone (+0.17). 

However, after that race, she didn’t click into her downhill skis until the World Cup in Cortina d’Ampezzo, where she unfortunately crashed. The crash resulted in her spraining her left leg ligaments, which kept her out of the next eleven races. 

Shiffrin stated, “Obviously, I had that crash, and that spurred us to just kind of consider what’s the most effective way for me to train and prepare for these races?” 

“Ideally, I want to be racing more speed,” she continued. 

Her team decided that it was best to target super-G. She stated, “Downhill just takes so much time. One race takes three to four days with training runs.”

During her explanation, she touched on her love for speed events, especially downhill. Nevertheless, she needed to reassess her strategy to maintain her top presence in the other three events. 

She stated, “I don’t want to believe it (last January) would be my last downhill race, because I love it so much, but it’s not my priority.”

100th World Cup Victory in Reach

Coming into the 2024/25 season, Shiffrin is only three wins away from achieving her 100th career World Cup victory. Although she is not placing huge significance on this milestone. 

She stated, “It (the 100th victory) doesn’t have significance to me personally. It’s the same as it was with 86. It’s not a goal that I set out to achieve, and that hasn’t really changed.” 

“However, if I’m in good shape, and if it does happen, I do see it as quite a really big opportunity to sort of bolster all the stories that are happening in ski racing right now. There’s so much to be excited about, and so many stories in the sport, even beyond my own,” she continued. 

Her, her team, and the Share Winter Foundation have been working on a campaign for the 100th victory if it does happen. This initiative seeks to enhance awareness and improve accessibility to snow sports.

This season she is committed to doing the best that she can. “I used to have all sorts of goals I could list, like overall globe, GS globe, slalom globe, winning at home, all these things.”

“Now, I’m just like, do the best I can. Hopefully that includes some victories, and we’ll see,” she continued. 

The first World Cup race this season will be the giant slalom in Sölden, Austria, on Oct. 26.