2024 Women's Overall World Cup
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The women's overall competition in the 2024 FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup consisted of 39 events in four disciplines: downhill (DH) (8 races), super-G (SG) (9 races), giant slalom (GS) (11 races), and slalom (SL) (11 races). [1] The schedule initially was planned to consist of 45 events, but two downhills on the Matterhorn in mid-November 2023 were cancelled due to high winds and not rescheduled. [2] As noted below in the season summary, four more speed races scheduled for February were also cancelled, reducing the total number of season events to 39 (with 4 downhills and 2 super-Gs having been cancelled).
After an injury to two-time defending champion (and five-time overall champion) Mikaela Shiffrin, the season championship became a battle between 2016 overall champion Lara Gut-Behrami of Switzerland and 2020 overall champion Federica Brignone of Italy, which went down to the technical races at the finals in Saalbach-Hinterglemm, Austria before Gut-Behrami triumphed for her second overall title, eight years after her first. In addition, Gut-Behrami also won the super-G and giant slalom disciplines and was leading in the downhill discipline going into the last race of the finals, giving her the chance to tie the women's record of four titles in one season, held jointly by Americans Shiffrin (2019) and Lindsey Vonn (2010 and 2012) and Slovenian Tina Maze (2013) -- although only Shiffrin did it without a championship in the combined discipline, which Gut-Behrami was also trying to do. [3] However, in that last race, Gut-Behrami lost the downhill discipline title to Cornelia Hütter of Austria, which nevertheless left her with three titles, including a discipline record-tying fifth in super-G.
As is the case every fourth year, there were no other major FIS events (world championships or Olympics) taking place during this season. [4] The fifth and sixth existing disciplines, parallel (PAR) and Alpine combined (AC), were eliminated from future World Cup schedules due to a lack of participation or interest in staging these events, and a new event that had been contemplated on the tentative schedule for the season, a team combined (which had been planned for 16 February 2024 at Crans Montana), was also eliminated and replaced with an additional downhill. [4] Thus, for the second straight season, only the four major disciplines were contested.
The first three races to be held during the season were all technical events (a giant slalom and two slaloms) and saw three former overall champions (and the top three finishers from 2023) emerge victorious: 2016 champion (and 2023 runner-up) Lara Gut-Behrami of Switzerland; 2021 champion (and 2023 third place) Petra Vlhová of Slovakia; and two-time defending champion (and five-time overall champion) Mikaela Shiffrin of the United States. The next two technical events (in the US, a giant slalom and a slalom) were won by Gut-Behrami and Shiffrin (her record 90th win overall), enabling Shiffrin to open an 84-point lead for the season over Vlhová. [5] The following two races, both giant slaloms, which ended the North American portion of the season, were both won by 2020 champion Federica Brignone, moving her into fourth place overall—which meant that the only four former women's overall champions still active occupied the top four places for the season. [6]
The speed events (downhill and super-G) did not begin until the eighth event of the season, with three races in St. Moritz, Switzerland. The first race was easily won by three-time defending downhill champion Sofia Goggia, who triumphed by almost a second over the field. [7] The win moved Goggia into sixth place in the season. However, Shiffrin beat Goggia in the next event, a downhill, and moved into a 195-point lead for the season over Brignone, who was third. [8]
The next two races were speed races at Val d'Isère; Shiffrin skipped the downhill, and Brignone won the super-G, which Shiffrin failed to finish, moving Brignone to within 63 points of Shiffrin's lead. [9] However, the last race before Christmas was another slalom, and Shiffrin's runner-up finish moved her overall lead back over 140 points. [10] And then the final two races of 2023, both at Lienz, were a giant slalom and a slalom, both won by Shiffrin after huge first runs, which gave her 93 total World Cup victories and stretched her lead for the season over Brignone to 263 points and over Vlhova to 328 points. [11]
The new year started in the rain and fog of Kranjska Gora, Slovenia, where Shiffrin struggled on the soft snow conditions, but her overall lead remained at over 200 points. [12] Shiffrin then missed a three-race weekend (two super-Gs and a downhill) at Zauchensee due to personal illness. [13] However, as the races had three different winners (Sofia Goggia in the downhill and Cornelia Hütter and Gut-Behrami in the super-Gs), the closest competitor to Shiffrin remained Brignone at 140 points behind. [14] Shiffrin then recovered in time for the weeknight slalom in Flachau, which she won to increase her lead to 227 points over runner-up Vlhová and also tie Ingemar Stenmark's record for career podiums in one discipline (81, also in slalom. [15]
The next race (a giant slalom at Jasná) took place about 17 km south of Vlhová's hometown, but unfortunately featured Vlhová suffering a season-ending injury near the beginning of her opening run, which made Gut-Behrami (320 points behind) and Brignone (322 points behind) into Shiffrin's closest active pursuers. [16] [17] Shiffrin then won the slalom the next day to all but clinch the season championship in that discipline—and break Stenmark's record for career podiums in one discipline. [18]
However, in the very next race of the season, a downhill at Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy, Shiffrin herself sprained a couple of ligaments, including her left MCL, in a crash that took her into the safety netting around the course; although she did not sustain season-ending ligament damage, she immediately cancelled her three planned appearances in the following week of racing and was unclear when she would return after that. [19] [20] In keeping with the season, both downhills there were won by different racers; five different women have won the five downhills to this point of the season, while Gut-Behrami, who moved into third in the discipline after Brignone crashed immediately after Shiffrin, also moved into the runner-up spot overall, 295 points behind Shiffrin. [21] The plethora of crashes and serious injuries (including several other season-ending injuries) at this point in the season was contributing to a movement to require World Cup skiers to wear cut-proof underwear, described by one source as "made of resistant polyethylene substances that are said to be stronger than steel or Kevlar on a per-weight basis", to prevent cuts from their ski edges during such crashes. [22] In the final race of the weekend, four-time super-G discipline champion Gut-Behrami took advantage of Shiffrin's absence by winning her second straight super-G to close to within 195 points of Shiffrin. [23]
Two days later, with Shiffrin still out, Gut-Behrami also won a giant slalom in nearby Kronplatz, which not only moved her into sixth place for all-time World Cup victories among women with 42, but also cut down Shiffrin's overall lead to 95 points. [24] The following two races, a downhill and a super-G scheduled for the first week of February in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany, were then cancelled due to warm weather, giving Shiffrin and the other injured skiers another week to recover. [25] However, even the time off didn't affect the proliferation of injuries, with Goggia, who was again leading the downhill discipline, requiring immediate surgery after breaking two bones in her right leg while doing giant slalom training in Italy, putting her on the sidelines for the rest of the season as well. [26] At the next race, a giant slalom in Soldeu, Andorra, Gut-Behrami won again, coming from ninth after the first run to edge Alice Robinson by one-one-hundredth of a second to accomplish two goals: (1) taking the overall lead from Shiffrin (by 5 points); and (2) virtually clinching her first career discipline title in giant slalom (with a 135-point lead over Brignone with just two races to go, and no one else still in contention). [27] One commentator noted that Shiffrin had won her first overall championship in 2017 when Gut-Behrami, who was leading, was injured in February and missed the rest of the season, and Shiffrin came from behind to win; the question still was whether this year would be the reverse. [28] And Gut-Behrami had won her only championship the year before, in 2016, when the same thing happened to overall leader Lindsey Vonn, ending her season—ironically at Soldeu.
In the next race, the first of two downhills at Crans Montana, Switzerland on 16 February, Gut-Behrami won again, in front of the home crowd, and stretched her lead over Shiffin to 105 points. [29] At about the same time, Shiffrin issued a statement saying that she didn't plan to return until the giant slalom and slalom at Åre, Sweden, on 9–10 March, the week before the World Cup finals. [30] When Gut-Behrami placed third the next day, she took over the season lead in the downhill discipline as well, giving her the current lead in every discipline except slalom as well as the overall lead. [31] With a sixth-place finish in the third race, a super-G, Gut-Behrami's lead over Shiffrin grew to 205 points, while Brignone, who was second, closed to within 81 points of Shiffrin. [32] Heavy snowfall in Val di Fassa, Italy prompted cancellation of both super-Gs scheduled there at the end of February, leaving only eight races in the season. [33]
At the beginning of March, two speed races were held in Kvitfjell, but heavy snowfall wiped out both practice runs for the downhill, forcing back-to-back super-Gs to be held. Gut-behrami won the first race [34] and was second the next day behind Brignone in a race delayed repeatedly by fog, [35] moving Brignone past the still-absent Shiffrin into second place by 59 points, but still behind Gut-Behrami by 326 points. Shiffrin then announced that she would return for no more than three of the remaining six races in the season, meaning that she would not be able to catch Gut-Behrami, whom she congratulated for her "stunning" season, including five victories during Shiffrin's absence. [36] That left Brignone as the only remaining threat to Gut-Behrami, and she rose to the occasion: in the next race, a giant slalom at Åre, Brignone rallied from over a second down after the first run to post the fastest time on the second run and win, which allowed her to close within 286 points. [37] The next day, Shiffrin finally returned from her injury (after missing eleven races in total) and posted the fastest time on each leg of the slalom at Are, not only winning the race by over a second but also clinching her record-tying eighth victory in the discipline. [38]
The last events of the season are scheduled for the World Cup finals at Saalbach-Hinterglemm, Austria. This season, for the first time, the finals will take place over two weekends—16-17 March 2024 for the technical events and 22–24 March 2024 for the speed events—with the last race for the women (the downhill) taking place on Saturday, 23 March. Only the top 25 in each discipline and the winner of the Junior World Championship in each discipline are eligible to compete in the finals, with the exception that any skier who has scored at least 500 points in the overall classification is eligible to participate in any discipline, regardless of her standing in that discipline for the season.
After only 8 races, on 8 December, Shiffrin had reached the 500-point milestone for the season; by 27 January 2024 (24 races), eight skiers (Shiffrin, Vhlová, Gut-Behrami, Brignone, Goggia, Sara Hector (Sweden), Hütter, and Michelle Gisin (Switzerland)) had already reached that standard. Ultimately, heading into the finals after 35 races, 14 skiers had scored at least 500 points in all disciplines: the eight already named plus Marta Bassino (Italy), Stephanie Venier (Austria), Ragnhild Mowinckel (Norway), Alice Robinson (New Zealand). Zrinka Ljutić (Croatia), and Lena Dürr (Germany). At that point, the only skiers with points in all four disciplines were Brignone, Shiffrin, Gisin, and Emma Aicher (Germany).
In the first race in the new finals format, Shiffrin, who had already clinched the slalom discipline championship, won the slalom final for her 97th total World Cup victory (and 60th victory in slalom) in her final race of the season. [39] In the next race, giant slalom, Brignone began the day 282 points behind Gut-Behrami with only a maximum of 300 points left. Because of the special scoring rules for the finals, the only way for Brignone to win at least a share of the season title involved two steps: (1) Brignone winning all three of the remaining finals (worth 300 points), and (2) Gut-Behrami not finishing higher than 14th in any one race (worth 18 points) and not finishing in the top 15 in the other two (worth 0 points), giving both women a season total of 1,672 points. Brignone lived up to her part of the challenge, winning the first race by almost a second and a half. However, Gut-Behrami finished that final in 10th (worth 26 points), giving her the overall season championship (208 points ahead and only 200 points remaining). [3] Similarly, in Super-G, Brignone needed to finish at least second, with Gut-Behrami not finishing in the top eight, in order to come from behind in that discipline, and she did finish second . . . but Gut-Behrami finished seventh to hang on to that discipline title as well. [40]
However, in the last women's race at finals (downhill), Gut-Behrami's chance of winning four season titles (overall, super-G, giant slalom, and downhill) ended when she finished almost two seconds behind Cornelia Hütter, who began the race in fourth place in the season rankings, which surprisingly gave Hütter the downhill discipline crown. [41]
Lara Gut-Behrami is a Swiss World Cup alpine ski racer who competes in all disciplines and specializes in the speed events of downhill and Super-G. She won the gold medal in the super-G event at the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing. With 45 World Cup victories to her name across 3 disciplines, she is one of the all time greats in Alpine skiing.
Federica Brignone is an Italian World Cup alpine ski racer. She competes in all alpine disciplines, with a focus on giant slalom and super-G. Brignone won the World Cup overall title in 2020, becoming the first Italian female to achieve this feat. She is also an Olympic and World Championship medalist. At the 2022 Winter Olympics, she won a silver medal in the giant slalom and a bronze in the combined.
Mikaela Pauline Shiffrin is an American World Cup alpine skier who has the most World Cup wins of any alpine skier in history. She is considered one of the greatest alpine skiers of all time. She is a two-time Olympic Gold Medalist, a five-time Overall World Cup champion, a four-time world champion in slalom, and an eight-time winner of the World Cup discipline title in that event. Shiffrin, at 18 years and 345 days, is the youngest slalom gold medalist in Olympic history.
Petra Vlhová is a Slovak World Cup alpine ski racer who specialises in the technical events of slalom and giant slalom. Vlhová won the World Cup overall title in 2021 and the gold medal in the 2022 Winter Olympics in the slalom event, becoming the first Slovak skier to achieve these feats.
The women's downhill in the 2021 FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup consisted of seven events. The original schedule had called for eight downhills, but the World Cup finals race was canceled.
The women's overall in the 2021 FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup involved 31 events in 5 disciplines: downhill (DH), Super-G (SG), giant slalom (GS), slalom (SL), and parallel (PAR). The sixth discipline, Alpine combined (AC), had all three of its events in the 2020–21 season cancelled, The tentative women's season schedule included 37 events, but the final women's schedule cut the number of events to 34 due to the continuing disruption cased by the COVID-19 pandemic. Among the changes were the elimination of the three Alpine combined races to eliminate the mixing of speed skiers and technical skiers in those events, as well as the elimination of two of the three parallels in favor of other races. Ultimately, only three of the races in this schedule -- one downhill, one Super-G, and one giant slalom -- were canceled during the season, as discussed later.
The women's overall in the 2020 FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup involved 30 events in 6 disciplines: downhill (DH), Super-G (SG), giant slalom (GS), slalom (SL), Alpine combined (AC), and parallel (PAR). This was the first year that parallel was treated as a separate discipline; prior to the 2019–20 season, it had been a sub-element of the slalom discipline. The season had originally been scheduled to have 41 races, but 11 races that had originally been scheduled were canceled during the season, mostly due to the COVID-19 pandemic, as discussed below.
The women's slalom in the 2022 FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup consisted of 9 events, including the final.
The women's giant slalom World Cup 2021/2022 consisted of 9 events including the final. Overall World Cup leader Mikaela Shiffrin from the United States, who started out in the early lead in this discipline, contracted COVID-19 at the end of 2021 and missed the post-Christmas giant slalom, then Shiffrin lost the lead in this discipline to Sara Hector of Sweden in the first race in 2022.
The women's downhill in the 2022 FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup consisted of nine events including the finals. Defending champion Sofia Goggia of Italy, who won four of the five downhills in which she competed in 2020–21, continued her domination in 2021–22 by again winning four of the first five downhills. Goggia took a commanding lead in the discipline after American Breezy Johnson, who finished second in each of the first three downhills, missed the rest of the season with a knee injury. Goggia then suffered her own knee injury, including a broken bone and ligament tears, while training for the last downhill prior to the 2022 Winter Olympics, but she was able to continue competing within a month and, after all but the final race of the season, had such a commanding lead that only one other competitor even had a theoretical possibility of overtaking her. At the finals, Suter failed to score, and Goggia won her second consecutive discipline championship.
The women's super-G in the 2022 FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup consisted of nine events including the final. Although no Italian woman had ever won the super-G championship, the battle in 2021-22 was between three of them: speed specialists Sofia Goggia and Elena Curtoni plus 2020 overall champion Federica Brignone. Through the first six races, Curtoni had won one, and each of the others had won two. However, Goggia was injured in a crash in the sixth race, in Cortina d'Ampezzo, and missed the next set of speed races as well as the super-G in the 2022 Winter Olympics. The seventh race, which was held days before the Winter Olympics, was skipped by many of the other top competitors, but was won by Brignone, enabling her to open a sizable lead in the discipline, and Brignone was able to clinch the season championship in the next Super-G when neither Curtoni nor Goggia scored points.
The women's overall in the 2022 FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup consisted of 37 events in 5 disciplines: downhill (DH), Super-G (SG), giant slalom (GS), slalom (SL), and parallel (PAR). The sixth discipline, Alpine combined (AC), had all of its events in the 2021–22 season cancelled due to the continuing schedule disruption cased by the COVID-19 pandemic, which also happened in 2020-21. In an adjustment that was partially motivated by the pandemic, each of the four main disciplines had nine races, while the parallel discipline had only one. The season did not have any cancellations.
The women's super-G in the 2023 FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup included eight events, including the final. The original schedule called for nine events, but a scheduled downhill at St. Anton on 14 January was converted to a super-G due to the inability to hold pre-race practice runs on either of the two days prior to the event. A later super-G at Cortina was converted into a downhill to restore the original schedule balance, but then a downhill at Crans Montana on 25 February had to be delayed a day due to fog and dangerous course conditions, and the super-G previously scheduled for that day was cancelled and not rescheduled.
The women's giant slalom in the 2023 FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup included ten events, including the final. The season was scheduled to open in Sölden, Austria on 22 October 2022, but the race was cancelled due to bad weather and rescheduled to Semmering, Austria on 27 December.
The women's slalom in the 2023 FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup consisted of eleven events, including the final. The original schedule also called for eleven events, but a night slalom at Zagreb on 5 January was cancelled due to high winds and warm weather and not immediately rescheduled. However, a week later, the race was rescheduled as a second slalom at Špindlerův Mlýn on 28 January, accompanied by a shift of the giant slalom scheduled there that day to Kronplatz on 25 January.
The women's overall competition in the 2023 FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup consisted of 38 events in four disciplines: downhill (DH), super-G (SG), giant slalom (GS), and slalom (SL). The fifth and sixth disciplines, parallel (PAR). and Alpine combined (AC), had all events in the 2022–23 season cancelled, either due to the schedule disruption cased by the COVID-19 pandemic (AC) or due to bad weather (PAR). The original schedule called for 42 races, but in addition to the parallel, two downhills and a super-G were cancelled during the season.
The women's giant slalom in the 2024 FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup included eleven events, including the final. The season opened in Sölden, Austria on 28 October 2023. After an injury to defending champion Mikaela Shiffrin of the United States, the season championship became a battle between Lara Gut-Behrami of Switzerland and Federica Brignone of Italy, which went down to the last race of the season at the finals in Saalbach-Hinterglemm, Austria before Gut-Behrami triumphed.
The women's slalom in the 2024 FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup consisted of eleven events, including the final. The slalom season began with the traditional "reindeer" opening races in Levi, Finland on 11-12 November 2023. Defending champion Mikaela Shiffrin of the United States repeated as champion, her eighth victory in the discipline, tying the record for most victories in one discipline.
The women's downhill in the 2024 FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup consisted of eight events, including the final. The tentative schedule called for eleven events, but a new event, the team combined, which was scheduled for 16 February 2024 in Crans Montana, was cancelled and converted into an additional downhill on the final schedule, increasing the planned schedule to twelve. However, as discussed below in the season summary, cancellations reduced that number during the season. The season champion was Cornelia Hütter of Austria, ending a string of three straight season triumphs by Sofia Goggia of Italy, who was injured just after the midpoint of the season but still finished third.
The women's super-G in the 2023 FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup consisted of nine events, including the final. One super-G on 10 December in St. Moritz was canceled, but it was rescheduled as a second super-G in Zauchensee on 12 January. As discussed in the season summary below, three more cancellations took place during February, reducing the season to eight races, but one downhill was then converted to a super-G to produce the final total of nine.