Mikaela Shiffrin is 0 for 2 at the 2026 Winter Olympics, although her best event is still to come later this week.
Shiffrin finished 11th in Sunday’s giant slalom, the competition consisting of two ski races across the morning and early afternoon at the Tofane Alpine Skiing Centre in Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy. Her combined time of 2:14.42 was nearly a second behind the first-place finisher.
Italy’s Federica Brignone — donning her now-iconic tiger helmet and experiencing the peak of her career at the age of 35 — took gold in convincing fashion for her home country on Sunday. Brignone’s combined time of 2:13.50 across the two races beat Sweden’s Sara Hector and Norway’s Thea Louise Stjernesund (the two having tied for silver) by .62 seconds.
It’s Brignone’s second gold of these Games; she also won super-G on Thursday, providing arguably the most uplifting storyline of these Olympics for the host nation. Making her February all the more legendary: Brignone is less than a year removed from a crash, which left her with multiple broken bones in her left leg that required multiple surgeries and hardware to repair. It took her months to rehab to the point of being able to smoothly walk again. Her comeback has empowered her to the best skiing of her terrific career.
“That was, like, the greatest show of GS skiing that we’ve had in a really long time,” Shiffrin stated Sunday. “And to do it, you know, at the Olympics where people actually have eyes on the sport. Federica skied incredible. That was so cool to watch.”
Brignone’s super-G gold made her the oldest winner of any woman ever in an Olympics alpine racing event. On Sunday, she bested her record by three more days. Both wins were safely hers, too. Brignone easily cleared in Thursday’s super-G by .41 seconds. On Sunday, an even larger gap (on a shorter course) with her invigorating gold medal ski.
What’s more, her dual win in the super-G and giant slalom makes Brignone the first female skier to win both golds in the same Olympics. A truly legendary week for the woman who goes by “La Tigre,” who’s competing in her fifth Olympics and now claims five Olympic medals (a silver and bronze in 2022 and a bronze in 2018).
Shiffrin has only one more shot to medal in Italy
As for Shiffrin, the Team USA standout and the most decorated competitive skier in history finished best among all Americans on Sunday but still didn’t come close to reaching the podium. She has failed to win a medal in eight straight Olympic events since the Winter Games in 2018.
Shiffrin shockingly failed to ski well enough on Tuesday in the women’s team combined. That was her first Olympic contest since her disastrous showing in China four years ago, when she left empty-handed despite racing in six events.
Every Shiffrin race in the Olympics is a marquee event, but there is necessary context with Sunday’s outcome: The 30-year-old has just one podium finish (third place at that) in the giant slalom in this most recent ski season. While she’s been rounding back into form after suffering a serious abdomen injury late in 2024, Shiffrin was not expected to finish in the top three of Sunday’s giant slalom. (She did take gold in the event eight years ago at the PyeongChang Games, however.)
Unlike four years ago in Beijing, Shiffrin got down both runs. A mental gate (or 50) cleared, to be sure. She skied clean and with good aggression.
Here’s her first leg from Sunday morning in Italy.
Shiffrin failing to medal was both disappointment and unsurprising.
And now her four-year buildup after Beijing will feed into a pressure-cooked Wednesday. That’s when Shiffrin’s best event, the slalom, awaits in the beautiful Dolomites. Shiffrin will be favored to take gold, even despite her poor showing in the slalom portion of the women’s team combined just a few days ago. Unlike giant slalom, Shiffrin’s been dominating in the tighter discipline of slalom since October. She won seven international competitions in the past three months, which boosted the anticipation factor in Cortina.
If she skies to her level, she will win gold — but just as importantly, she will end the drought. She will return to the top of a mountain, a perch she’s occupied more than 120 times in her career. No human has experienced victory in ski competition more often than Shiffrin.
Wednesday morning is quite possibly her last chance at redemption. A gold would reinforce her status as an immortal in skiing. But anything shy of a podium outcome for the 30-year-old would be a cruel late-career twist and reputation-altering result for the most accomplished skier the world has ever seen.
