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After posting the fastest first run of the day, Mikaela Shiffrin slid off the podium at the first World Cup race of the season on Saturday morning in Soelden, Austria. Shiffrin’s slow second and third sectors on the softening Rettenbach slope opened the door for Federica Brignone to become the oldest woman to win a World Cup.
“It’s true that this is spring snow and this is where I’m really good,” Brignone told FIS media. “I’m really proud. I wasn’t really expecting after the second run to win the race.”
The 34-year-old Italian took the top spot in the giant slalom with a two-run time of 2 minutes, 16.05 seconds as Shiffrin (2:17:26) fell to fifth. Alice Robinson (2:16.22) snagged her 10th World Cup podium in second and Austria’s Julia Scheib (2:17.13) delighted the home crowd by moving up 11 places to round out the podium.
Former DU skier Katie Hensien (2:17.16) was the top American. The 2022 NCAA slalom champion moved up from 17th to finish fourth after posting the fastest second run of the day. Nina O’Brien placed seventh and Paula Moltzan was 11th as the Americans put three in the top seven for the first time since 1992.
“I couldn’t have asked for a better day,” said Hensien, who made her Soelden debut after missing all of the 2023-24 season with an ACL and MCL tear in her left knee. “It’s really good to be able to trust my body again. My knee feels great, and I just trusted my skiing today (and) went for it.”
“I felt really free in the start gate that run and that for me is all I needed for today,” added O’Brien who also missed last season with injury. “It means everything. We were really there for each other throughout the rehab, so to share this moment, I don’t think we could have written it up any better.”
While Shiffrin’s first run wasn’t perfect, particularly at the beginning, her superb finish put her 0.22 ahead of Robinson and 0.40 up on Brignone. In fact, only four athletes were within 1.37 seconds of the Edwards superstar, who gave her fiancé, injured Norwegian skier Aleksander Aamodt Kilde, a hug in the finish area.
“I felt good. My preparation going to this race was quite strong, I am happy with my skiing right now. The only task is to bring more intensity or more aggression, try to find time somewhere,” Shiffrin told the Associated Press between runs.
“I had a moment where I didn’t really trust my direction where I was going,” Shiffrin continued. “It wasn’t a big mistake, it takes away your intensity a little bit. But then, after that, I was pushing even harder. Maybe it just took me until the pitch to turn on the gas. But even then it was really strong.”
Pushing the intensity envelope in the second run, however, interfered with timing through the turns Shiffrin said.
“This hill, if you’re fighting it, then it’s so slow,” she stated, adding that she knew something was off when she came over the break on the main pitch. “I was thinking, ‘maybe this is ok but I’ve got to try and get a little bit cleaner,’ and then I didn’t really get cleaner. By that point, if you don’t hit the timing right on the beginning, it’s hard to get it back.”
In letting her 98th World Cup win slip away, Shiffrin was deflated but not worried.
“My team has done such an amazing time to get exactly preparation we need — variety of conditions, different course settings, all the things to set up to be physically prepared for this race,” she said. “The final step is the mentality to bring all those top pieces of skiing out, and the right intensity and so it’s disappointing when we do every step of the way and then I don’t execute that final step… I’ve done it before and I know I’ll do it again.”
The entire podium noticed the tricky conditions brought on by softening afternoon snow.
“The upper part of the pitch was really bumpy, and, yeah, not easy. But from there on, I felt better,” Brignone told FIS. “I started skiing really good and pushing, and I was in the rhythm finally, and I could take this speed to the finish, and that was my force today.”
Robinson — who shocked the Alpine world by winning in Solden as a 17-year-old half a decade ago — said she normally struggles in moist, choppy slop.
“So, I was really happy that I kept really solid,” she said after her fourth runner-up finish in her past five GS events.
“It’s definitely gonna be a goal to get back to winning a race”” she continued. “But I mean I can’t really complain, starting a year off with the podium is always great.”
Defending GS and super-G crystal globe champion Lara Gut-Behrami — who also won the overall World Cup title last year at 32, sneaking past Shiffrin while the five-time champion came back from a downhill injury — didn’t start on Saturday. The Swiss star made the decision to sit out shortly before the race.
“During the inspection, doing the warmup, I understood it was not the day to race. You can not go to the start and feel 90% or have doubts about your health,” stated Gut-Behrami who has suffered from knee problems and also recently missed a week of training because of the flu. “I don’t want to be injured to stop my career. I just want to be able to understand when it’s over and I don’t think it’s today.”
Regarding the performances of Hensien, who started in bib No. 47, and O’Brien — who put on a bib for the first time since breaking her leg twice in two years — Shiffrin stated, “Unbelievable. … It’s really exciting to have such a strong showing for Americans the first race of the season.”
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