Mikaela Shiffrin’s awful Beijing Olympics continued Thursday, as the U.S. skier suffered a third did-not-finish (DNF).
Shiffrin arrived at the Winter Olympics looking to win a third consecutive gold, but, after prior course mishaps, the 26-year-old has sustained 60% of her career DNFs at the National Alpine Skiing Centre this month.
After failing to finish in her favorite events—slalom and giant slalom, in which she won gold in 2014 and 2015—earlier in Beijing, she said she had no intentions of skiing safe so as just to finish.
“It was not actually that much to ask for from myself, and I was starting to do it, and then I was out anyway,” Shiffrin said. “I don’t really understand it, and I’m not sure when I’m going to have much of an explanation. I can’t explain to you how frustrated I am to not know what I can learn from today.”
Despite her disappointing (thus far) Olympics, Shiffrin started well in the combined event, placing fifth in the downhill course to put her within range of a podium finish heading into the decisive slalom run.
“I finally felt I could really trust my instincts in the track,” Shiffrin said after her downhill run.
“The most disappointing thing, beyond walking away from the Games with no individual medals … is that I had multiple opportunities to ski slalom on this track, and I failed in all of them.
“That’s disappointing for me, it’s disappointing for my whole team, for the coaches, for everybody who’s been working so hard, and it’s disappointing for anybody back home who woke up and thought, especially today, ‘Hey, she did a pretty good downhill run, set up pretty well for the slalom.’
“Right now, I just feel like a joke.”
She said she’ll be back on the slopes tomorrow to practice for her final shot at a medal in Saturday’s mixed team event, wherein she will become only the second woman to race all six alpine skiing events at the Winter Olympics.
“There’s going to be a whole chaotic mess of crap that people are saying about how I just fantastically failed these last couple of weeks in the moments that actually counted,” Shiffrin said. “It’s really strange, but I’m not even afraid of that right now, and maybe it’s because I don’t have any emotional energy to give any more.”
Swiss skier Michelle Gisin eventually took gold in the alpine combined, roaring back from 12th after the downhill course to clinch gold ahead of compatriot Wendy Holdener, who got silver.
Italy’s Federica Brignone took bronze, while Czech star Ester Ledecká placed fourth—dashing her hopes of a second gold medal (snowboarding giant slalom).
