On a crisp Sunday morning in Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy, all eyes turned to the Tofane Alpine Ski Centre for the women’s giant slalom at the 2026 Winter Olympics. Mikaela Shiffrin, the American skiing sensation and all-time leader in World Cup victories, was among the favorites to reach the podium. Yet, as the snow settled and the final times flashed across the scoreboard, Shiffrin found herself in 11th place, her Olympic medal drought stretching to an unexpected eighth consecutive event.
Shiffrin, who trained at Burke Mountain Academy and has long been a dominant force on the World Cup circuit, completed her two runs with a combined time of 2:14.42. It was a clean performance, but not quite enough to challenge the extraordinary pace set by Italy’s Federica Brignone. The Italian, cheered on by a passionate home crowd, captured her second gold medal of these Games and the fifth Olympic medal of her career. Brignone’s remarkable comeback from a devastating injury just ten months ago added a layer of inspiration to her triumph.
“I’ve been in therapy for eight or more months, and started skiing just to see if I could ski,” Brignone reflected after the race. “It was day by day. We were trying new things. My mantra was, ‘Tomorrow is better, for sure.’ It has been really hard. For five months I didn’t even walk correctly. Then I started getting better and better.” Her resilience paid off handsomely, as she followed up her super-G gold from three days earlier with another dazzling performance in front of her countrymen and women.
In a twist rarely seen at this level, Sweden’s Sara Hector and Norway’s Thea Louise Stjernesund skied identical times in both the morning and afternoon runs, resulting in a split silver medal. Their achievement meant there was no bronze awarded in this event—a testament to just how fiercely contested the giant slalom was this year. After Brignone crossed the finish line, Hector and Stjernesund ran into the finish area and bowed to the champion as chants of “Fede” rang out from the stands.
For Shiffrin, the day was a mix of awe and introspection. “That was, like, the greatest show of GS skiing that we’ve had in a really long time,” she said, according to ESPN. “And to do it, you know, at the Olympics where people actually have eyes on the sport. Federica skied incredible. That was so cool to watch.” Despite her own result, Shiffrin displayed grace and sportsmanship, blowing out her cheeks and waving to fans in the grandstand after her second run.
Shiffrin’s journey to this point has been anything but straightforward. Although she boasts a staggering 108 World Cup wins—the most in history—her Olympic outings since the 2018 Games in PyeongChang have been fraught with disappointment. She has failed to reach the podium in eight straight Olympic events, a statistic that seems almost unfathomable for someone of her caliber. The struggles at the Beijing Olympics four years ago, where she was a favorite but failed to medal in all six events and didn’t finish three of them, still linger in the background.
Yet, Shiffrin’s recent form on the World Cup circuit hinted at a resurgence. She entered the Milan-Cortina Games having won seven of her last eight World Cup slalom races. In giant slalom, the discipline has been a rollercoaster: she didn’t reach the podium in 11 straight races between January 2024 and last month, but managed to claim third in Czechia just weeks before the Olympics. Her progression in the discipline has been steady, moving from sixth to fifth to fourth and finally to third in World Cup finishes leading up to Sunday’s Olympic race.
“I’m really proud of the progression,” Shiffrin said after her 11th-place finish. “To get back into the top seven in GS before the Olympics, that seemed like a really challenging task, especially at the beginning of the season.” Her words echoed a sense of perspective, shaped in part by the adversity she faced following a traumatic crash at a World Cup giant slalom race in Killington, Vermont, in November 2024. The accident left her with a puncture wound and nearly a lacerated colon—a harrowing experience that lingered in her mind long after the physical scars began to heal.
In an article for the Players’ Tribune last May, Shiffrin opened up about the psychological aftermath: “I’d get these random flashes in my mind. These really grim images. I’d be anticipating crashes. I’d see them in my head. See myself falling and going down. The pain would flash through my body, only this time, it was my neck too. My leg. My colon.” The mental hurdles have been as significant as the physical ones, but Sunday’s race offered a different, more hopeful view of the European mountains ahead.
Shiffrin wasn’t the only American in the mix. Paula Moltzan finished 15th with a time of 2:14.77, while Nina O’Brien came in 20th. A.J. Hurt, unfortunately, did not finish after missing a gate in the morning session. The results, while respectable, underscored the challenges facing the U.S. women’s alpine team as they look to recapture former Olympic glories.
Brignone’s victory was a celebration not just of athletic excellence, but of perseverance. “I think if I was coming here to make gold medals, I’d make no medals,” she said. “It’s a miracle to be here, to carry the flag. This was one of the biggest things that I was missing in my life. Not the gold medal. I didn’t care. I had medals. I had World Cups. I had everything that I wanted, even more in my life. So I came here just to enjoy and try my best, and be grateful to be here at the home Olympics.”
As the Olympic schedule marches on, Shiffrin has one more shot at redemption: the women’s slalom, her signature event, set for Wednesday, February 18. It’s an event where she has dominated the World Cup circuit, and hopes are high that she can finally break her Olympic medal drought. “You’re standing there and you can see the whole GS course laid out in front of you,” Shiffrin mused about her Olympic experience. “It’s this really cool feeling that I know what’s coming, I’m going to push and earn this. And I wanted to earn it with my skiing.”
With the giant slalom now in the rearview mirror, the stage is set for one more chapter in Shiffrin’s remarkable Olympic journey. The world will be watching Wednesday, wondering if this time, the stars will finally align for one of alpine skiing’s greatest talents.