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CORTINA D’AMPEZZO, Italy (AP) — An ear-to-ear smile. No regrets. And one other medal wrapped round her neck.
What a refreshing sight it was to see Mikaela Shiffrin basking within the afternoon daylight after one other profitable day within the Italian Dolomites.
Make {that a} profitable world championships.
After gathering her fourth medal in as many races Saturday by taking bronze within the concluding slalom, the American skier was requested if she was content material with how all the things went over these two weeks.
“Sure. That’s an enormous, resounding sure,” Shiffrin replied. “I imply that’s unimaginable. I had deliberate for 4 races and I assumed, ‘OK, that’s 4 probabilities for a medal. Hopefully someplace in these two weeks I can do some good snowboarding.’ And I’m actually pleased with a lot of the snowboarding I did.”
It wasn’t simply the snowboarding, although.
Seemingly weighed down by her personal expectations and outdoors strain at previous worlds and Olympics, Shiffrin by no means appeared in the least disturbed in Cortina.
“Day by day had one thing actually particular, and it’s one thing to smile about,” she mentioned.
One good second was this: Having simply seen her report streak of 4 straight slalom world titles ended by Austrian upstart Katharina Liensberger in emphatic trend, Shiffrin was the primary racer to run over and congratulate the brand new champion.Shiffrin congratulates Liensberger.
“If this was last year, I would be maybe disappointed but not as grateful for the good moments in the day,” Shiffrin said, referring to her nearly two-second deficit behind Liensberger.
This season, though, is a different one for Shiffrin. She took a 10-month break from racing last year after the death of her father, Jeff Shiffrin, then had her comeback slowed by the coronavirus pandemic and a back injury.
No wonder she wasn’t about to commit to taking the same, more relaxed approach to next year’s Beijing Olympics.
“I would like to,” she said. “It just totally depends on how next season is going leading up to that. Because I can feel amazing now, with a good mentality and then that totally changes. I feel like this past year lasted like 20 years. So I don’t know what’s in store for the next year. But I imagine it’s going to be eventful.”
Having never before entered so many races at a worlds or Olympics, Shiffrin leaves Cortina with gold in combined, silver in giant slalom and bronze in super-G and slalom.
Perhaps even more remarkable is that Shiffrin has now medaled in 10 straight races at worlds — and in 11 of her 13 career starts at her next biggest event after the Olympics.
“I do have a safe now,” she said. “So I’ll probably put (the medals) in there. Or maybe hang them up.
“I like to put the globes (the crystal globes for World Cup titles) around the house, because they’re super pretty. But people ask to see the medals and I’m like, ‘Oh yeah, sure, I’ll go get them.’ But otherwise it just seems like a whole lot of value for me to possibly lose. So just put them somewhere where you just don’t touch it.”Shiffrin shows off her bronze medal.
While Shiffrin showed impressive speed last week in her first super-G race in more than a year, she won’t be competing when the World Cup resumes next weekend in nearby Val di Fassa with two downhills and a super-G.
“No, I’ve got to go shave two seconds off my slalom,” she said with a smile.
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Associated Press writer Eric Willemsen contributed to this report.
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More AP skiing: https://apnews.com/hub/skiing and https://twitter.com/AP_Sports
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Andrew Dampf is at https://twitter.com/AndrewDampf
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