Mikaela Shiffrin races into history with 87th World Cup victory, breaking tie with Stenmark
No one better.
Mikaela Shiffrin surpassed Ingemar Stenmark’s long-standing record for all-time World Cup wins Saturday with her 87th victory. The historic win, in a slalom in Are, Sweden, came just one day after Shiffrin matched the Swedish legend’s record, a mark that had stood for 34 years.
“Pretty hard to comprehend that thought,” Shiffrin said. “Holy crap.”
Just as she did Friday, Shiffrin built a big lead — 0.69 seconds — in the first run, with only two skiers within a second of her. With Wendy Holdener trying to make a charge, Shiffrin needed to be aggressive but controlled in the second run and that’s exactly what she did. She flows through the tightly-spaced gates rather than fighting them, and made a furious push to the finish line.
Shiffrin dropped to a crouch after she crossed the finish and buried her head in her knees, taking a few seconds to let the magnitude of the moment sink in. Other skiers rushed to congratulate her and she was then surprised by her brother, Taylor, who’d flown in from the United States with his wife for the race. Taylor Shiffrin lifted his sister up in a bear hug while members of the U.S. team passed around hats with the number 87 emblazoned on them.
“Congratulations to you (for) breaking my record,” Stenmark said in an NBC video. “It was fantastic.”
Dominant, too. Shiffrin finished a whopping 0.92 seconds ahead of Holdener of Switzerland. Sweden’s Anna Swenn Larsson was 0.95 seconds back of Shiffrin.
The win was Shiffrin’s 13th of the season, second only to the record 17 races she won in 2019. She has clinched the overall, slalom and giant slalom season titles, and now has 15 globes for her career.
And the season isn’t done yet. The World Cup Finals are next week in Andorra, and Shiffrin is expected to race in the slalom, giant slalom and super-G.
“When I was in the start gate for the second run, I still felt nervous,” Shiffrin said. “For me, that’s a sign I have no lack of motivation even when the results, the goal isn’t there. It’s the skiing that I want to do. And every day, I wake up and I want to do it, again and again.
“That’s not done yet. That’s stronger than ever.”
NEVER MISS A MOMENT: Follow our sports newsletter for daily updates
Coming full circle
There was poetic symmetry to Shiffrin’s accomplishments this week.
Are is where Shiffrin got her very first World Cup win, in a slalom race back in 2012, and it’s also in Stenmark’s home country. Stenmark’s last World Cup win came in Aspen, Colo., the state where Shiffrin grew up and still makes her off-season home.
Shiffrin said she has gotten multiple messages from Stenmark — “He must not be sleeping!” — over the last couple of days, but he was not in Are to see his record fall. He makes few public appearances, and told The Associated Press last month that he wanted to be respectful of Sweden’s skiers. Sweden had two women in the top 10 Saturday, and Sara Hector was third in the giant slalom Friday.
But Stenmark followed Shiffrin’s pursuit of his record and counts himself among her fans.
“I think she can win more than 100,” Stenmark told the AP. “It depends on how many years she continues. But for sure 100.”
An unbeatable record falls
When Stenmark retired, his 86 wins seemed like a record that would never be matched. Annemarie Moser-Proell was No. 2 on the list at the time, and she’d won 24 fewer races. Alberto Tomba, Hermann Maier, Marcel Hirscher – none could challenge Stenmark.