Kajsa Vickhoff Lie celebrates Norway’s first women’s World Cup downhill victory: GEPA Photos

At the completion of every regular World Cup season, the best 25 in each discipline are invited to compete in their event at the World Cup Finals. This year there was a tie for 25th so there are 26 women who qualified. The FIS also invites the reigning FIS World Junior Champion to compete in their discipline. This season’s women’s downhill junior champion is Switzerlands, Stefanie Grob. Assuming she decides to race in Soldeu it will be her 3rd World Cup start but her first downhill. She raced two giant slaloms in Semmering Austria in December.

Also, the overall title contenders with 500 points or more points can compete in all the events. As it stands at the moment, this season, there is only one woman who has yet to race a 2023 downhill who is eligible. However, it is unlikely she will. Also, Wendy Holdener has raced one downhill, has 693 points and could race the downhill.

Ages of the best 26

The average age of the best 26 women’s downhill skiers of the season is 28.8 years old. The youngest among the 26 best is Norway’s, 24-year-old Kajsa Vickhoff Lie. The oldest is Slovenia’s, Ilka Stuhec who is 32. Both won this season. Notably, the average age of the four 2022-23 World Cup downhill winners was 29.5 and the average age of the top ten highest ranked is 28.7.

Italian Sofia Goggia won five of the eight downhills and her teammate Elena Curtoni, Slovenia’s Stuhec and Norway’s Vickhoff Lie each won one. No other nation could earn a women’s World Cup downhill victory. However, the twenty-nine-year-old Swiss skier Jasmine Flury won the 2023 Meribel World Championship downhill. Vickhoff Lie’s Kvitfjell World Cup downhill victory was the first for the Norwegian women and she delivered it on home soil.

North Americans

It required 89 downhill World Cup points this season to qualify for the finals. Notably, Stifel US Alpine Team members Mikaela Shiffrin (7th), Breezy Johnson (13th), and Isabella Wright (21st) are the US women who have qualified for the World Cup downhill finals. None of the Canadian women could earn an invitation to Soldeu Andorra.

The women’s World Cup downhill final is scheduled for March 15th in Soldeu, Andorra.

Eight nations have an athlete ranked in the top 25 downhill season standings

• Switzerland has 6 and the Junior World Champion
• Austria has 7
• Italy has 5
• USA has 3
• Norway has 2
• France has 1
• Germany has 1
• Slovenia has 1

Italy’s Goggia will arrive at the finals, having earned the women’s downhill World Cup season title. It is the fourth of her career and her third consecutive. Goggia’s favorite saying is “only the brave.”

Due to the limited field size, only the top 15 finishers earn World Cup points at the World Cup finals.

Top 25 2023 women’s downhill skiers

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