Mikaela Shiffrin won't defend giant slalom title at FIS Alpine Ski World Championship, citing PTSD from crash
Team USA skier Mikaela Shiffrin will not defend her giant slalom gold medal at the 2025 FIS Alpine Ski World Championship, which is taking place this week. Shiffrin announced the news with an Instagram post on Monday, saying that she was experiencing a "mental/PTSD struggle" in the event.
Shiffrin wiped out on giant slalom during the Killington Cup in Vermont at the end of November. The crash left her with a deep puncture wound in her abdomen and severe muscle trauma.
"Honestly, I really didn't anticipate experiencing so much of this kind of mental/PTSD struggle in GS from my injury in Killington," Shiffrin wrote in Monday's post. "Like always, I tried diving into the challenge, hoping to get there by Worlds. I figured my passion and longing to compete would outweigh the mental barriers. Maybe that will be the case over time, but I'm not there yet. Coming to terms with how much fear I have doing an event that I loved so dearly only 2 months ago has been soul-crushing.
"One of my teammates — who knows this experience well — said that the only thing you can do is keep trying. So that's what I will do."
Shiffrin said that now that she is not doing giant slalom, she will join Team USA for the Team Combined event, which takes place on Tuesday.
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Shiffrin's crash happened while she was on the verge of her historic 100th FIS win. For now, she sits at 99 wins — still a record number in the sport.
Shiffrin told the Associated Press on Monday that she had thought she would be fine after some practice in Europe, but has found that not to be the case. The competition, which is taking place in Saalbach-Hinterglemm, Austria, began last Tuesday, with the women's giant slalom event set to take place this coming Thursday.
"I figured once we touched ground in Europe and we got a chance to get some repetitive training days, I would be able to improve step by step and sort of the passion and the longing for racing was going to outweigh any fear that I had," Shiffrin said.
The world championships take place every other year; Shiffrin won gold in the event in 2023, also taking home silvers in slalom and Super-G.
After the fall in Killington, Shiffrin posted a video on social media, where she said that she was fine and that there was "not really too much cause for concern at this point." But injury was more serious than she might have let on. The stab wound she sustained from the fall nearly punctured her abdominal wall and colon, and was "a millimeter from pretty catastrophic," per the Associated Press.
Shiffrin returned to racing on Jan. 30 with a slalom race in Courchevel, France, where she finished in 10th place.
After the World Championships, there are five more competitions on the circuit for the 2024-2025 FIS season, ending with a competition in Idaho's Sun Valley from March 22-27. It is unclear what Shiffrin's plans are for these final competitions, and if she will still try for her 100th win before the season is over.
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