American superstar Mikaela Shiffrin can’t get in touch with the Chinese snow. After her surprising exit a few days ago in the giant slalom, she now also did not make it to the finish of the slalom competition. It went wrong very quickly in her first run. In 2014 she won Olympic gold in this part.
Mikaela Shiffrin had come to Beijing with a clear goal in mind: take gold at least once and become the first American alpine skier to win three gold medals.
Things went wrong in the giant slalom at the beginning of this week. There she was unable to defend her title after a quick error. Today she had a second chance in the slalom. Here too, she was one of the big favorites as the champion of the Games in 2014, but again her run lasted only a few seconds.
Shiffrin, 26, lost control of the Chinese snow early on and missed one of the first gates.
Shiffrin’s disappointment was evident. She sat on one side for a very long time, with her head between her knees.
Shiffrin will probably still have opportunities in Beijing because she had indicated in advance that she wanted to participate in all competitions.
“I want to call my father, but he is not there anymore”
When Shiffrin finally got off the mountain, she could barely hold back her tears. “I went to the extreme. I was not allowed to make a single mistake. This is a very big disappointment.”
“Of course the pressure is high here, but it didn’t feel like that was the problem today. I know this isn’t the end of the world, and it’s stupid to be so devastated about this, but I’m posing a lot of things now in question.”
Will she still be skiing in Beijing? “Yeah, I don’t know. I’ll try to recharge again, maybe a little better this time. But I don’t really know how. No way. I’ve never been in this situation and don’t really know what to do .”
I’ve never experienced this before so I really don’t know what to do now. It feels like I worked really hard to ski 5 meters here.
“The descent looks incredible, but there are other skiers who could take my place. So if I do go out at the fifth gate, I might be better off in my spot.”
“Giant slalom and slalom were my main goals so right now it feels like I worked really hard for nothing. I trained to ski five meters here.”
Shiffrin has also been through a lot in her personal life, such as the loss of her father in an accident two years ago. “That puts this into perspective a bit, but I just really want to call him now. He would tell me not to worry. But he’s not here so I’m mad at him too. That makes it worse .”
“In 24 hours nobody, or almost nobody, will care about this anymore. We’ll see.”
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