Still clouds in my head
Shiffrin learns bitter Olympic lesson
2/15/2022, 1:14 p.m
So far, the Olympic Games in Beijing have been anything but good for the American ski dominator Mikaela Shiffrin. After the disappointments in the technical disciplines, she slowly regains her self-confidence – and gives deep insights into her mental state.
The freak weather is a thing of the past, the sky is shining steel blue again over the Olympic site of Yanqing. But in her head, reports ski star Mikaela Shiffrin, it’s still “cloudy”. The dark days in China have left their mark on today’s greatest ski racer.
Four races, twice the bitter and tearful end, a ninth and an 18th place – a disappointing result. The 26-year-old has the last chance for an individual medal this Thursday in the alpine combination. At least since the departure of the ailing slalom Olympic champion Petra Vlhova, who was still second behind Shiffrin at the World Cup, the American is considered the top favorite.
But what does that mean after all the low blows? She felt “emotionally tired,” says Shiffrin open-heartedly, and with this “dullness” in her head, it’s not fast. “It was hard to read all the headlines: kicked out, failed, disappointed the world,” she says. But it’s true, she herself sees these games as “failures”. Until now.
“… that makes it difficult to drive freely”
On a date with her boyfriend Aleksander Aamodt Kilde, who won silver and bronze in Beijing, she tried to get her mind off things on Valentine’s Day. But of course it was all about skiing again. “Hours upon hours” she did video analysis, she says, “I tend to think too much – and that makes it difficult to drive freely”.
The seemingly playful has always distinguished Shiffrin, her instinct for this breakneck sport. She was deeply unsettled by the fact that she could no longer rely on it. She admits that she felt like a beginner on a crash course on the descent. Your problem: In the station wagon, this is the first sub-discipline. The descent and the following slalom “couldn’t be more different,” says Shiffrin, “it’s like doing two different sports on the same day.”
What if it goes wrong again? She could point to her Olympic victories in 2014 and 2018 or the other 12 medals at major events, she says, “but that doesn’t take away the pain for me”. Only success dispels the clouds in her head.