Mikaela Shiffrin entered the slalom portion of the Alpine combined race in fifth place on Thursday after an impressive downhill run and was looking to reverse her Olympic woes with a medal in her last individual race of the 2022 Beijing Games.
She had previously called her first races in Beijing a “failure,” and a podium finish would have been a fairy-tale ending and the ultimate redemption.
But it wasn’t to be.
The 26-year-old American crashed out of the race about 10 gates into the run and recorded her third “did not finish” at the Olympics. She appeared to be fighting tears on the side of the course after she picked herself up.
Switzerland’s Michelle Gisin ultimately won the gold, with her fellow countrywoman Wendy Holdener earning silver. Italy’s Federica Brignone won the bronze.
“Oh, man, I don’t know if anybody has failed that hard with so many opportunities maybe in the history of the Olympics,” Shiffrin said in an interview on NBC following the race. “But I’ll take it. I mean, it is a joke. That’s fine. I just really selfishly wanted to have a good run of slalom down this hill, and I’ll be left wanting there.”
It has been an unexpectedly disappointing Olympics for Shiffrin. Already one of the most decorated skiers in the sport and one of the most recognizable athletes competing in the Winter Games, Shiffrin arrived in Beijing with sky-high expectations and all the attention that follows. She entered with three Olympic medals, including two golds, and one more would tie Julia Mancuso for the most by an American woman in Alpine skiing and another gold would give her the most by any American skier in the sport. It felt inevitable she was bound for the history books.
But in Shiffrin’s first competition, the giant slalom, in which she was the defending gold medalist, she recorded an…
Source : espn
