“No advertising for sport”
Trouble over the ski slope in the women’s slalom
12/29/2025 – 7:14 a.mReading time: 1 min.
Mikaela Shiffrin also wins the fifth slalom of the season. But the race also upsets the German team – for a specific reason.
The women’s slalom world cup at Semmering in Austria has sparked some debate. Because the first round was a debacle. Almost half of the riders failed, the slope does not meet the demands.
A total of 39 athletes took off, fell or were unable to cope with the conditions. German head coach Andy Puelacher made it clear: “That was definitely not an advertisement for skiing.”
One reason was apparently the quality of the snow. The route was a little harder at the top and a little softer at the bottom. “The service people at the start didn’t know at all how to adjust the material. No wonder there were so many threaders afterwards,” continued Puelacher.
Mikaela Shiffrin was once again unstoppable by all of this: fifth slalom, fifth victory – after a race to catch up, the American extended her record to eight victories on the Zauberberg. “It was tough today,” said the 30-year-old, who improved from fourth place with the best time in the second run. In her 106th World Cup victory, Shiffrin ended up just ahead of world champion Camille Rast (Switzerland/+0.09 seconds) and Lara Colturi (Albania/+0.57).
However, Shiffrin had to worry a bit about the victory: Austria and Switzerland had lodged a protest with the race jury – in their opinion, the slalom queen had exceeded the time limit when inspecting the second run. But the protest was rejected.