Mikaela Shiffrin has a large lead in the World Cup overall standings and is leading the slalom standings in what has become a duel with Slovakia’s Petra Vlhova, but she is in the thick of a cluster struggling for supremacy in women’s giant slalom.
Shiffrin finished third Friday in a GS at Lienz, Austria, only 0.08 of a second behind winner Federica Brignone of Italy and 0.04 behind runner-up Viktoria Rebensburg of Germany. It was Shiffrin’s third podium in four GS races this season and her ninth in 12 races across all disciplines. Shiffrin won a slalom in Lienz on Thursday.
“I’m really happy with my performance over the two days, but it always stings a little bit when you think, ‘Third place, eight hundredths from the lead, or four hundredths from second place,’ itap really close,” Shiffrin told reporters in the finish area. “But it means itap a good competition with the women. Thatap really exciting for us, itap exciting for the fans and I definitely was attacking on the second run.”
Rebensburg took over first place in the GS standings from Shiffrin, who is only 13 points behind. Tessa Worley of France is third in the GS standings, 48 points behind Shiffrin. Rebensburg picked up 80 points for finishing second while Shiffrin garnered 60, which also trimmed Shiffrin’s lead over Rebensburg in the overall standings, but Shiffrin still has a points lead of 881-510.
The women who specialize in slalom and GS are in the middle of an exhausting part of their season. Including the Lienz races, they will have seven races over 13 days in four countries. They have a “city race” in Oslo on Jan. 1, a slalom in Croatia on Jan. 3, a GS and slalom Jan. 6-7 in Slovenia and a slalom back in Austria on Jan. 9.
“Itap really busy now,” Shiffrin said. “I had two days off before we came into these races and I sort of thought, ‘OK, those are my days off for the next two or three weeks.’ We all saw the schedule this year and we know that itap going to be busy now. There’s not a lot of time for rest, but I am for sure motivated for these races.”
Women’s World Cup standings
Mikaela Shiffrin, EagleVail, 881 points
Viktoria Rebensburg, Germany, 510
Petra Vlhova, Slovakia, 385
Tina Weirather, Liechtenstein, 374
Tessa Worley, France, 336
