Mikaela Shiffrin picked up her first FIS World Cup downhill win of the 2019-20 season in Bansko, Bulgaria. And in only her second race back after injury. Federica Brignone of Italy took second place and Joana Haehlen of Switzerland stepped on her first World Cup podium in third.
Shiffrin was all smiles at the bottom of the course when she came down with a lead, even though she was worried that she hadn’t had enough time on her downhill boards this season. “I feel really good,” she said. “I felt so much more confident with my skiing today. The training yesterday was my first run on my downhill skis since Lake Louise, so I was just trying to ski down the hill and be clean if I could. Today I felt better with my line, better with my attitude on my skis and better with my technique. So all of those things ended up piecing the track together really well.”
Shiffrin won her first downhill two seasons ago in Lake Louise and was second in the Lake Louise downhill this season, but with only 11 World Cup downhills under her belt, she’s still building her confidence. “I wasn’t confident—I was maybe even a little bit scared,” she said. “But I was like, let’s do it. It’s time to go now—let’s just try. So it was pretty exciting to come to the finish and see that it was fast.”
With her victory in Bansko, Shiffrin's win record brings her to a total of 65—only behind Lindsey Vonn (82) in the all-time women’s list. She also sits comfortably in the lead in the overall hunt with 1,075 points—280 points ahead of Federica Brignone of Italy. Her win also brought her to second place in the downhill standings behind Corinne Suter of Switzerland.
All three of the podium took their chances from the second set of ten to go down but there was still time for Elena Curtoni and then Marta Bassino, a more recognised Giant Slalom racer, to finish in fourth and fifth with slalom specialist and Giant Slalom World Champion, Petra Vlhova taking sixth!
This was the race that replaced the cancelled race from Val d'Isere.
Full results
Adapted from US Ski Team Press release