Lenzerheide, Switzerland – Lindsey Kildow followed Bode Miller’s
successful pursuit of the World Cup title last week with the keen
interest of an athlete who is convinced she can accomplish the same
thing someday.
Her coaches believe she can do it, too.
The 20-year-old Ski Club Vail product was on the World Cup podium
six times in downhill and super-G this season, capturing her first
World Cup victory Dec. 3 at Lake Louise, Alberta. Her immediate
goal is to learn from the mistakes she made at last month’s world
championships so she can challenge for medals at the 2006 Turin
Olympics. But after that, winning the World Cup will become a major
objective.
“First priority, obviously, is downhill and super-G, trying to win
those (World Cup) titles, but I think slalom and giant slalom will
come around enough after the Olympics, so (the overall) will be the
next thing I focus on,” Kildow said.
Like Miller, Kildow is a four-event racer, so she knows the magnitude of the struggle Miller
overcame to become the first American since 1983 to win the Cup.
Miller raced every World Cup race the past three seasons, plus
every race at two world championships.
“It’s really hard,” Kildow said. “It’s all about time
management, managing rest time with training time. Training is the
most important thing for me to ski well in GS and slalom. I’ve been
learning a lot the last two years, because I have been doing four
events. Hopefully after the Olympics I will have a pretty good
rhythm of training and racing.”
Kildow finished sixth in the women’s overall standings while
scoring well in two events, finishing third in super-G and fifth in
downhill. Miller won the World Cup, scoring well in three events,
although he finished only two of nine slaloms.
“If I can maintain momentum and get going in one more event, it’s
much more likely than not that I will be competitive in the
overall,” Kildow said.
U.S. Ski Team officials don’t think Kildow’s timeline is overly
ambitious.
“Provided she stays healthy, I would say she’s about two years
away from being in contention for that,” alpine director Jesse
Hunt said. “She skis all four disciplines well now, but she needs
to improve her rankings in (giant slalom and slalom).”
Improving her rankings in GS and slalom would get her better start
positions, which would put her in striking distance of the podium
in those disciplines.
The world championships were a sobering experience for Kildow, who
expected to challenge for medals in downhill, super-G and combined
despite being one of the youngest competitors. She finished fourth
in the downhill and combined, missing medals by a combined margin
of less than half a second, and was ninth in super-G.
Most racers her age would have been happy with those results, but
Kildow is admittedly impatient by nature, and she took it hard.
“What I realized at the world championships is that the big events
take a much different approach than normal World Cups,” Kildow
said. “You have to ski with so much emotion and so much heart,
because every single person is giving it everything they have.”
Kildow wanted the world championships to be a dress rehearsal for
the Olympics, but she hoped to learn different lessons than the
hard ones she got. That’s probably good for her, even if she
doesn’t want to admit it.
“The Olympics is all going to be in my head,” Kildow said. “If I
don’t ski well, it’s because of my own stupidity. It’s frustrating
for me, because I know what has to be done; I know what it takes.
But at world champs I didn’t do it.”
Kildow ended the season mentally fatigued, and her results tailed
off. At the World Cup Finals she finished fourth (again) in the
super-G and seventh in the slalom. She crashed in the downhill.
“I am not the least bit physically tired,” Kildow said. “I could
keep going for another couple months. It’s all in my head. I got
down on myself, and I have to come back up.”
When she was 13, Kildow sat down with her father and wrote out a
long-term career plan. Winning the World Cup was the goal for 2007.
Seven years later, she appears to be right on schedule.
“I just have a lot of expectations for myself,” Kildow said. “I
know what I can achieve.”
John Meyer can be reached at 303-820-1616 or
jmeyer@denverpost.com.
