Mikaela Shiffrin on Tuesday rebounded from a crash that she said left her with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) with a record-equaling 15th medal at the FIS Alpine World Ski Championships in Saalbach, Austria.
Shiffrin teamed up with Breezy Johnson, who won individual downhill gold just weeks after returning to action from a 14-month ban for three anti-doping whereabouts failures, to win the combined event.
The victory, thanks to Johnson’s fourth-fastest downhill and Shiffrin’s third-fastest slalom, marked a stunning return to action for the latter following an abdominal puncture wound she sustained in a heavy fall in Killington in November last year.
Photo: AFP
It was Shiffrin’s eighth career gold medal from the world championships and her overall tally of 15 ties her with German skier Christl Cranz, who was active in the 1930s.
However, the 29-year-old American said that competing in the Austrian resort had been a daunting prospect after her crash.
Shiffrin on Monday announced she would not be defending her giant slalom title through fear, citing PTSD-like problems with the discipline.
“It’s scary, but I want to be here,” Shiffrin said. “In the last two weeks, I haven’t felt that a lot. I haven’t felt like I wanted to be here. I felt like it’s too fucking terrifying.”
Competing at a world champs was more than just about battling for medals, she added.
That is perhaps easy coming from the mouth of someone whose eight golds include four in the slalom, two in combined and one each in the giant slalom and super-G, as well as four silvers and three bronzes.
“So many people say the only thing that counts is medals, but in the end, when you break it down, it’s how you act and it’s how you support each other,” she said.
Johnson, who has been a friend and competitor of Shiffrin’s since the age of 11, hailed her teammate’s return as “super impressive.”
“I wanted to help her because I feel like she deserves it after everything that she’s been through and all the ways that she’s helped me from when I was just a little kid,” she said.
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