Mikaela Shiffrin, racing for the first time since January, on Saturday settled for second place behind Petra Vlhova in a FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup slalom, but still “felt a lot of happiness” to finally get back in the start gate.
“I enjoy a second place more than I did ever before, because I felt I was pushing and having some good skiing,” said Shiffrin, a winner of 66 World Cup races. “It was the best I could today. I feel I can be more proud of that than I used to be.”
Vlhova, the World Cup slalom champion from Slovakia, posted the fastest times in both runs to beat the American by 0.18 seconds in Finnish Lapland, north of the Arctic Circle.
Photo: EPA-EFE
Yet for Shiffrin, the result was not her biggest concern.
“It’s been really hard to imagine being here again and racing, and being on the podium. That’s just something I almost didn’t dare to really imagine, because you don’t want to be disappointed again,” the double Olympic and three-time overall champion said.
Shiffrin’s previous season ended prematurely after the death of her father. That was followed by the cancellation of the season-ending races amid the COVID-19 outbreak, and then she sat out the first race of the new season last month with a back injury.
The 25-year-old Shiffrin had wondered whether she wanted to continue her career, but after the race she sounded optimistic.
“I hope from here I can keep going because I want to,” she said. “I felt a lot of happiness skiing today, and racing. I had fun and I felt I did some really good skiing.”
Racing the second run on a course set by her coach Livio Magoni, Vlhova earned her fourth straight slalom win.
“I tried to take this advantage that my coach set the course, and I did it,” Vlhova said. “It wasn’t easy, as it started snowing and also the course was a bit destroyed, but I did it and I am really happy.”
Since January 2017, the last 27 World Cup slaloms have all been won by either Shiffrin, with 19 wins, or Vlhova.
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