SPINDLERUV MLYN, Czech Republic (AP) — Mikaela Shiffrin locked up the World Cup slalom title with two races to spare on Sunday, becoming the first skier with nine season titles in one discipline.
The American star dominated the last slalom before the Olympics, winning both runs to beat runner-up Camille Rast, the world champion from Switzerland, by 1.67 seconds. The rest of the field, led by Germany's Emma Aicher, trailed by more than two seconds.
The race took place at the Czech venue of Shiffrin's World Cup debut at age 15 in March 2011.
“It just feels amazing to be here. I feel like when I was 15 years old still, like, I don’t know, just love skiing. I just love skiing. That’s the best feeling to be here," Shiffrin said in a course-side interview.
No other skier, female or male, in the six-decade-long history of the World Cup has won more than eight globes in a single event.
Shiffrin shared the previous best mark with American teammate Lindsey Vonn, who has eight downhill titles and leads those standings again in the current season.
On the men’s side, Ingemar Stenmark won the slalom globe and Marcel Hirscher the overall title eight times each.
“It's actually hard to think about that today because there was so much to think about on the race course,” Shiffrin said. “So now it's like a nice surprise.”
Shiffrin won her first slalom globe at age 18 in March 2013, her most recent one came two years ago. Last season, she led the standings but then missed two months of racing following a GS crash and Zrinka Ljutic of Croatia took the title.
Shiffrin’s 71 career race wins in slalom and 108 overall are both records for men and women.
Shiffrin’s seven wins from eight slaloms give her an insurmountable 288-point lead over second-placed Rast in the season standings. There are two more slaloms scheduled after the Olympics, with a race win worth 100 points.
Rast triumphed in the only slalom Shiffrin didn’t win this season, in Slovenia three weeks ago.
Shiffrin's victory came a day after she earned her first giant slalom podium in two years.
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