American Mikaela Shiffrin won the Zagreb slalom on Wednesday, her 81st victory on the world circuit, and is one unit closer to the iconic record of her compatriot Lindsey Vonn.
Shiffrin offered her fifth consecutive success in the World Cup by beating the Slovak Olympic champion Petra Vlhova by 76 hundredths and the Swede Anna Swenn Larsson by 1 second 21 hundredths. “I’m very happy, I had a lot of fun skiing, I produced my best ski in both runs. I took the risks I needed. It’s an incredible feeling when everything happens like that,” she said at the microphone of the International Ski Federation (FIS).
Already in the lead after the first round, Shiffrin drove the nail home on the second layout of a track made difficult by the mild temperatures of the past few days. On cloud nine, the 27-year-old American has won the last five races on the world circuit (a super-G, two giants, two slaloms) to bring her total to 81. Already a four-time winner of the big crystal globe, Shiffrin s flew in the general classification of the World Cup with 389 points ahead of his runner-up, Petra Vlhova.
She will have the opportunity on Thursday during a new slalom in Zagreb to equal the women’s record for World Cup victories of her compatriot Lindsey Vonn (82), retired since 2019. She will then be able to tackle the absolute record held by the Swede Ingemar Stenmark (86).
