Shiffrin Takes A Second And A Fifth For Her Return Weekend
The American slalom Queen came out swinging for her return to the World Cup racing circuit. This past weekend the alpine women were in Levi, Finland for a doubleheader of slalom action in which Mikaela Shiffrin took one podium spot the first day and a fifth on the following day.
Coming out on Saturday, November 21, the young slalom specialist looked almost as if she had not been out of the game for 300 days. She came out strong and even held the first position during the second run. However, long-time rival Petra Vlhova, the Slovak slalom specialist that was the only woman to top Shiffrin for years in the discipline, was able to win the day again edging Shiffrin out of first by just 0.18 of a second.
On Sunday, the women took to the Levi course once again, this time seeing Shiffrin land fourth position after the first run. Though skiing strong, she was not able to come up with a podium finish that day, ending the long run of Shiffrin/Vlhova one-twos that the racing fans have been growing quite accustomed to.
It would seem, however, that Shiffrin was happy with her performance over the weekend. “It’s incredible to be here,” said Mikaela. “I had two really solid races and it was an incredible weekend. I feel really grateful that I’m able to do these races and I was able to participate again.”
The end of the weekend would see Petra Vlhova taking back to back wins, continuing a slalom winning streak that extends to the end of the last season. As for the rest of the field on Sunday, Michelle Gisin of Switzerland took the second spot on the podium, Katharina Liensberger of Austria took third, with Wendy Holderner, also Swiss, taking fourth ahead of Shiffrin.
Currently, though still very early in the season, Mikaela Shiffrin is holding third place in the overall.
Thumbnail Credit: Greenlionfrommars, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
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