Sacred at Schladming in 2013 and Saint-Moritz in 2017, the skier from Grand-Bornand, second in the first run, made a mistake on Thursday during the giant slalom at the Courchevel-Méribel Worlds.
Best time in the first run, the American Mikaela Shiffrin held on, Thursday February 16 in Méribel, to win her seventh world title at the 2023 Alpine Skiing World Championships. She beat the Italian Federica Brignone (+0 ”12) and the Norwegian Ragnhild Mowinckel (+0”22). At 33, Tessa Worley has long dreamed of winning her third title as a giant, after Schladming (Austria) in 2013 and Saint-Moritz (Switzerland) in 2017. But in the final wall, when she had set the second fastest time in the first run, she made a mistake.
On a track at Roc de Fer, facing south, increasingly degraded because of the heat, and despite the support of her fan club who came in large numbers from Grand-Bornand, the Frenchwoman was unable to achieve the exploit, she who had not climbed on the slightest podium this winter and who dreamed of finishing in style for her last world championships.
“I dreamed of bringing a medal here“. A few minutes after her second run, Tessa Worley admitted to having passed “the finish line heartbroken“, at the microphone of France televisions. The woman with 16 World Cup victories – all in giant – had given herself the means to achieve this, at the end of the first round drawn by the tricolor coach Jean-Noël Martin , and concluded just 12 hundredths from the American star. With bib 1 on her shoulders, the same one that had brought her luck during her two world titles, she therefore rushed from the starting gate full of confidence and want to finish the job in the second run.
Showing green on the first three intermediates, Tessa Worley seemed to deliver the desired ski, fluid and well placed, despite increasingly sticky snow. But right in the heart of the final wall, an interior fault came to spoil the party which promised to be immense. His fall immediately extinguished the fire set by the thousands of spectators present around the Roc de Fer to encourage the “Chip” of Grand-Bornand. From joy to disarray, Méribel suddenly plunged into silence, after releasing in chorus this famous “Ooooh!” of sadness and disappointment.
A long-awaited first for Mikaela Shiffrin
This cruel scenario has benefited the greatest skier in history. Mikaela Shiffrin who, with 85 successes on the circuit, will soon equal and exceed the historic record of World Cup victories (86, by Ingemar Stenmark), went to seek the last great title which she lacked.
Best time in the first run, the American therefore won her first crown in giant slalom after three consecutive podiums at the Worlds (2nd in 2021 and 2017, then 3rd in 2019). A year after the completely failed Olympics in Beijing (zero medals, three retirements), Mikaela Shiffrin has unquestionably become the Queen of world skiing.