Mikaela Shiffrin hoping to play right cards during World Cup season and Olympics

In relation to Alpine snowboarding and the Olympics, Mikaela Shiffrin says she’s not a lot of a gambler, because the American all-rounder prefers Girl Luck to play no half in her outcomes.

However with the game uncovered to the weather and the whims of Mom Nature, a race will be selected one thing so simple as the luck of the draw.

Over the course of an Alpine World Cup season, that good and unhealthy fortune tends to steadiness out.

At an Olympics, nevertheless, you get one shot and every thing has to go proper in that second, and for Shiffrin, that hasn’t at all times been the case.

“I actually don’t like the concept that my outcomes are primarily based off luck however generally that performs extra of a job than others and that’s undoubtedly the case on the Olympics,” Shiffrin instructed reporters final week throughout name from Soelden, Austria, the place she is getting ready for the beginning of the brand new World Cup marketing campaign this weekend.

“On the finish of the day you can also make each transfer proper, you will be rested, able to go, sturdy and it may well nonetheless be completely tousled for causes which can be utterly out of your management.

“I don’t actually love that as a result of I are typically tremendous controlling over every thing that’s occurring in my life so it’s form of like nails on a chalkboard to me.

“It’s extra like playing than racing.”

Nonetheless, there will likely be few betting in opposition to Shiffrin including to her Olympic haul at subsequent 12 months’s Beijing Winter Video games, the place she plans to compete in each Alpine occasion.

Shiffrin already has a pair of Olympic titles, successful slalom gold on the 2014 Sochi Olympics and the enormous slalom on the 2018 Pyeongchang Video games.

Whereas double-Olympic champion has a pleasant ring to it, the outcomes are lower than anticipated from an athlete who has six world championships, 69 World Cup wins and three crystal globes for successful the general World Cup title.

The 2021-22 marketing campaign is shaping up as a season of huge desires for the 26-year-old American, who is raring to reassert herself as the game’s dominant athlete after greater than a 12 months of being slowed by again accidents, COVID-19 disruptions and the sudden loss of life of her father final February.

Requested whether or not one other total World Cup title or Olympic medals would imply extra, a considerate Shiffrin weighed her choices earlier than leaning extra in direction of an total title, since that may rely extra on efficiency than luck.

“That’s one thing I’m dreaming about, having the ability to compete in each occasion in China,” Shiffrin stated. “One other huge dream is to get again to the place the place I’m a contender for the general.

“If I might flash ahead to the top of the season I’d be way more disenchanted if I had basically skied sluggish or not stacked up for any of the World Cup races, however in some way gained a person or a number of medals on the Olympics.

“Luck sways the Olympic outcomes a lot greater than it does in any regular World Cup or if you take a look at the outcomes for all through a complete season.”