Shiffrin Wins First Career Downhill At Lake Louise

Mikaela Shiffrin (Eagle-Vail, CO) may have found a new favorite pair of Atomic skis, albeit just slightly longer than her previous favorite pair, after riding the long boards to her first career FIS Ski World Cup downhill victory Saturday.

With her win on the Olympic Downhill course and her slalom victory last weekend in Killington, Vermont Shiffrin proved that she is the best ski racer in the world six World Cup races into the Olympic season. The defending World Cup champion also extended her overall World Cup lead over Germany’s Viktoria Rebensburg to 149 points. This must now raise the question, is Mikaela Shiffrin the most dominant athlete in the world right now?

Rebensburg, the winner of the first two World Cup giant slalom races of the season, including last weekend in Killington, finished second Saturday. Swiss Michelle Gisin moved up from her eighth-place finish in Friday’s downhill, to round out the podium in third. Austria’s Cornelia Huetter, the winner of Friday’s downhill in Lake Louise, was fourth.

Stacey Cook (Mammoth Mountain, CA) posted another top-10 result at Lake Louise, finishing sixth. Lindsey Vonn (Vail, CO) rebounded from Friday’s crash to finish 12th. Jackie Wiles (Aurora, OR) was 23rd and Alice McKennis (New Castle, CO) was 35th and Alice Merryweather (Hingman, MA) was 37th. Breezy Johnson (Jackson Hole, WY) was on her way to another top-20 finish but slid out halfway down the track.

Saturday’s race was delayed one hour and 15 minutes due to a sub-station fire that knocked out power to the resort. Fortunately, the athletes were towed to the start thanks to a fleet of Prinoth snowcats at the resort.