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A16 SPORTS
Thursday 5 January 2023
Shiffrin takes slalom to move within 1 win of Vonn’s record

ZAGREB, Croatia (AP) — three seasons. Vlhová’s rise events: super-G, giant sla-
Mikaela Shiffrin felt “really to the top has motivated lom, and slalom.
excited” Wednesday after Shiffrin. Only two female racers
winning the first women’s “I feel like I would not be have won more races in
World Cup race of 2023. here tonight with skiing like succession: Swiss skier Vre-
And it wasn’t because she that, if it wasn’t for Petra ni Schneider won eight in
had just moved within one pushing the limits in the last 1988-89 and Germany’s
victory of Lindsey Vonn’s three years. She’s been so Katja Seizinger won six in
record. strong and it has encour- 1997.
“I skied better than I proba- aged me to keep working Earlier, Shiffrin won back-
bly ever have,” Shiffrin said. harder and harder and to-back slaloms in Finland
The defending overall harder,” Shiffrin said. to start the 2022-23 season.
champion dealt best with “Nothing less than the best On Wednesday, Shiffrin
difficult course conditions is going to work. I was tak- stood up to the challenge
to dominate a floodlit sla- ing all the risk I needed to defend her first-run lead
lom and raise her career United States’ Mikaela Shiffrin reacts after winning an alpine and made it on the finish as the last starter on the
tally to 81 World Cup wins. ski, women’s World Cup slalom race, in Zagreb, Croatia, and that’s just an amaz- deteriorating Crveni Spust
She could match the best Wednesday, Jan. 4, 2023. ing feeling when it’s good course.
mark Thursday at another Associated Press enough.” While no racers remained
slalom on the same course. “I’m happy, I’m incredibly onds, with the rest of the Shiffrin certainly has been without mistakes, Shiffrin
American standout Vonn happy. I mean, I had so field finishing more than more than just good never got in real trouble in
set the women’s record of much fun skiing today and 1.20 off the pace. enough in recent weeks. her final run. She even won
82 before retiring in 2019. it was really my best skiing The former overall champi- The four-time overall cham- time on Vlhová at every
The overall best mark is 86, both runs today,” said Shif- on of Slovakia had won the pion stretched her winning split and celebrated with
from Swedish great Inge- frin, who beat runner-up race on the outskirts of the streak to five races, which both arms up after crossing
mar Stenmark. Petra Vlhová by 0.76 sec- Croatian capital the past included three different the finish, followed by two
fist pumps.
“That was the most excit-
ing thing of the day, that
I felt so good skiing when
it’s a bit softer. The victory
is incredible, but I’m more
happy with how I feel, it’s
just calm,” Shiffrin said.
The American said she
used new skis which she
and her equipment sup-
plier Atomic developed
over the past two years.
The new set-up is meant to
give her a better control
on softer courses that have
been injected with water
and salt like the one in Za-
greb.
Shiffrin drew an unfavor-
able start number and
began the opening run
last among the top-seven
ranked racers. But she did
best to keep the line be-
tween the gates, despite
being bounced around
by ruts and waves in the
rather soft snow surface af-
ter days with temperatures
of 10 to 15 degrees Celsius
(50-59 Fahrenheit).
“These kinds of conditions
have been challenging for
me, in the last two years es-
pecially. But tonight, it was
just a really perfect com-
bination of the equipment
with my skiing,” Shiffrin said.
“I’m just thankful when it
goes well. In the last five
races it went really went
well. So, now I am just on
a groove and keep riding
the wave until the wave is
over.”q