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.
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 super-G in the 2021 FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup consisted of 6 events, with one cancellation from the scheduled seven. Swiss skier Lara Gut-Behrami won four of the first five Super-Gs to establish an 195-point lead over Swiss teammate and defending discipline champion Corinne Suter with only two races to go, and she clinched the discipline title for 2021 after the sixth event, which turned out to be the last one for the season.
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 Combined in the 2020 Alpine Skiing World Cup involved two events, although four had been scheduled. A combined at Val d'Isère, France on 22 December 2019 was cancelled due to heavy snowfall, which forced the downhill scheduled for the day before to be shifted back a day, and a combined at La Thuile, Italy on 1 March was also cancelled due to heavy snowfall the challenge in rescheduling during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The women's super-G competition of the Beijing 2022 Olympics was held on 11 February 2022 on the "Rock" course at Yanqing National Alpine Ski Centre ski resort in Yanqing District. Lara Gut-Behrami of Switzerland won her first gold medal, confirming her status as a defending world champion. Mirjam Puchner of Austria became the silver medalist, winning her first Olympic medal, and Michelle Gisin of Switzerland won bronze.
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 downhill in the 2023 FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup consisted of nine events, including the final. The original schedule called for eleven events, but the first two races of the season scheduled for 5 and 6 November 2022 in Zermatt/Cervinia, were canceled due to adverse weather conditions; the FIS decided not to reschedule them. Once the season began, a downhill scheduled in St. Anton on 14 January had to be converted into a Super-G due to the inability to hold a pre-race training run on either of the two days prior to the downhill. However, a subsequent Super-G scheduled at Cortina d'Ampezzo was converted into a downhill, restoring the original schedule.
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 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 downhill in the 2019 FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup involved eight events, including the season finals in Soldeu, Andorra. Defending discipline champion Sofia Goggia of Italy fractured her ankle prior to the start of the season and missed five of the eight events, ending her chances to repeat. In addition, 2018 runner-up Lindsey Vonn of the USA, who had closed the prior season by winning all of the final four downhills and needed only four more victories to equal Ingemar Stenmark's all-time World Cup victory record, began the season injured and announced her planned retirement at the end of the season, but was hampered during her comeback by her cumulative injuries, and finally retired immediately after the conclusion of the 2019 World Ski Championships.
The women's super-G competition in the 2016 FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup involved sight events, including the season final in St. Moritz, Switzerland.
The 2023–24 FIS Alpine Ski World Cup, organised by the International Ski Federation (FIS) was the 58th World Cup season in alpine skiing for men and women.
The women's overall competition in the 2024 FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup consisted of 39 events in four disciplines: downhill (DH), super-G (SG), giant slalom (GS), and slalom (SL). 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. 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.
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 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 overall competition in the 2025 FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup is scheduled to consist of 37 events in four disciplines: downhill (DH), super-G (SG), giant slalom (GS), and slalom (SL). After cancellations in both of the prior two seasons, the two downhills scheduled on the Matterhorn in mid-November were removed from the schedule. Also, for the third straight season, only the four major disciplines will be contested on the World Cup circuit.
The women's giant slalom in the 2025 FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup is scheduled to include ten events, including the final. The season opened in Sölden, Austria on 26 October 2024.
