Mikaela Shiffrin admits overall World Cup title chances are ‘mathematically a huge stretch’
While making progress in her injury recovery, the double Olympic champion acknowledges she was unable to anticipate her return to competition.
Alpine Skiing
Alpine skiing superstar Mikaela Shiffrin admitted that trying to win her sixth overall World Cup title this season has become a ‘huge stretch’ as she confirmed she would return racing in Are, Sweden, on 9 and 10 March.
The double Olympic champion is recovering from an injury suffered in the Cortina d’Ampezzo downhill at the end of January: “I have been progressing well. I’m feeling better and better each day,” she said on a video posted on her Instagram account.
“I’ve been able to get on snow this week. I have done some easy light volume and slalom open gates on flat terrain for two days. I've also tested it out with some light GS free skiing, and things are feeling pretty good.
“Over the next 10 days, we will be looking to ramp up into a little bit more with a little bit faster speeds … riding course setting, ideally a little bit more of an aggressive surface that is a bit more similar to a race venue.”
Mikaela Shiffrin on anticipating her comeback: 'It just wasn't possible...'
After Sunday’s first Super G in Val di Fassa, Italy, was cancelled due to heavy snow, Shiffrin will miss three of the remaining nine races scheduled until the end of the season.
She currently trails leader Lara Gut-Behrami by 205 points, and the deficit (with 100 points awarded to the winner of each race) could even double when she returns in Are.
“As soon as we realised that Andorra and Val di Fassa were not going to be possible, I had to kind of come to terms with the fact that the overall would mathematically be a really huge stretch,” she admitted.
“It's not really about fighting or not fighting for it. It just wasn't possible. Believe me, I would have tried if I remotely thought that I could just simply make it to the finish of a course somewhere safely, I would have tried. That is not in the cards yet, but I'm getting there.”
Shiffrin confessed that being away from the races offered her the chance to watch them with a ‘fresh perspective’ and to ‘appreciate the level of skiing’:
“Lara (Gut-Behrami) in particular has been stunning to watch. She is really at such a high level of racing right now. As much as I want to be competitive with that right now, we all just have to sit back and appreciate that and it was so exciting to watch AJ (Hurt) get her first GS podium in Andorra, and Paula (Moltzan) get her third World Cup podium in the slalom. That was so much fun to watch my team-mates do that there, and I just wish that I was there to celebrate with them.”