CORTINA D’AMPEZZO, Italy — Mikaela Shiffrin needs to race cleanly one more time to end an eight-year Olympic medal drought.
On Wednesday, the American skiing star nailed her first run through the women's slalom at Tofane. Her time of 47.13 put her 0.82 seconds ahead of Germany's Lena Duerr, who was one of the first racers.
Shiffrin, who is 30 years old and the most decorated skier ever, got off to a fast start but seemed to be in trouble after she fell through one gate around halfway down. She got better immediately, and when she saw her time, she pumped her first, which is a rare show of public emotion.
Cornelia Oehlund of Sweden came in third, one second behind. Camille Rast from Switzerland is in fourth place, 1.05 seconds behind, followed by her Swiss teammate Wendy Holdener.
Shiffrin glided into the starting gate in the Dolomites, still hunting for her first Olympic medal. She and her partner Breezy Johnson fell off the podium after a spectacularly poor run in the slalom, where they finished 15th. This destroyed their chance at gold in the women's combined.
Things didn't go much better for her placement-wise on Sunday during the giant slalom, as she came in 11th. Even yet, Shiffrin stayed positive, using the fact that she was only three-tenths of a second away from the medal stand as proof that she was becoming better.
The truth is that winning a medal in the giant slalom would have been a nice extra. She had just finished on the podium for the first time in two years in the GS when she came to Tofane. She wasn't a favorite.
But slalom is different. Shiffrin has already won her tenth World Cup season title in her best event, with seven firsts and a second in eight starts.
Shiffrin was amazing as she started seventh in perfect bluebird conditions on a course that Team USA officials called a "high-tempo ripper" over the radio. She was aggressive right from the start, and her time throughout the first segment was the fastest of all the top racers. The only time she wobbled was when she hit a gate.
For a split second, it looked like she was going to have another Olympic failure. Not this time. Her hips almost hypnotically moved her legs back and forth as she got back into the rhythm and form that has helped her win this event more than 70 times in her record-setting career.
One of those wins happened in Sochi twelve years ago, when Shiffrin stomped her way to gold as a young girl. People now think she's one of the best racers of all time, even though she didn't do well in Beijing four years ago, when she went 0 for 6.
When Shiffrin got to the jagged borders of the Dolomites, she was sure that the hard days she experienced in China were behind her.
She probably will if she can make a second run that looks like her first.
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