SAALBACH-HINTERGLEMM, Austria (AP) — Camille Rast beat teammate Wendy Holdener as Switzerland took gold and silver in the women’s slalom at the Alpine skiing world championships on Saturday.
Mikaela Shiffrin finished fifth and missed out on what would have been the American's record-setting 16th career medal from the worlds. She shares the best mark with German skier Christl Cranz, who won 15 medals in the 1930s.
Shiffrin had won a medal in slalom — including four gold — at all six previous world championships she competed in since 2013.
Rast held on to her first-run lead to beat Holdener by 0.46 seconds.
“Everything must fit to win a world title and today that was the case," Rast told Austrian TV. “We have a cool team spirit and push each other forward.”
Rast was competing at her fifth worlds and won her first medal, after she took gold in slalom at the 2017 junior world championships.
Rast leads the slalom season standings after getting the first two World Cup wins of her career.
Holdener posted the fastest second-run time to improve from fourth position and earn her third silver medal at the worlds, after finishing runner-up in the team combined with Lara Gut-Behrami and in the mixed-team parallel event last week.
Katharina Liensberger was 1.32 seconds behind in third took bronze. The Austrian won the slalom world title in 2021.
Liensberger edged out fourth-place Paula Moltzan for bronze by two-hundredths of a second. The American had won bronze in giant slalom on Thursday.
Shiffrin was third after the opening run, 0.72 behind Rast.
"I think that was some of the best skiing I’ve done lately,” said the American star after the first run.
Shiffrin has eight gold, four silver and three bronze medals from her 19 races at the worlds since 2013.
Shiffrin won gold with American teammate Breezy Johnson in the team combined on Tuesday but sat out the giant slalom two days later. She felt not ready yet to race GS after recovering from an abdominal injury sustained in a GS crash in Killington, Vermont in November.
“It was a big challenge to keep up with the pace, and for me especially on the end of the course,” Shiffrin said. “It’s like 15 seconds longer than anything I’ve skied since before Killington. I don’t have very much in my legs left.”
Zrinka Ljutic was one of the pre-race favorites after winning three of the last four slaloms on the World Cup circuit but the Croatian finished 2.73 seconds behind in ninth.
Defending champion Laurence St-Germain of Canada didn’t finish her first run.
Olympic slalom champion Petra Vlhova didn’t race as she’s still recovering from knee surgery a year ago. The Slovakian standout told Austrian TV she had “no idea” when she might return to racing.
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AP skiing: https://apnews.com/hub/alpine-skiing
The Associated Press
