Alpine Skiing-Rast ends Shiffrin's season-long slalom winning streak
Alpine Skiing - FIS Alpine Ski World Cup - Women's Slalom - Kranjska Gora, Slovenia - January 4, 2026 Switzerland's Camille Rast celebrates after winning the women's slalom REUTERS/Borut Zivulovic
KRANJSKA GORA, Slovenia, Jan 4 : Switzerland's Camille Rast completed a World Cup double and ended U.S. Alpine ski great Mikaela Shiffrin's season-long winning streak in slalom with victory in the Slovenian resort of Kranjska Gora on Sunday.
The win, by 0.14 seconds over the two legs, denied Shiffrin a sixth slalom success in six races this season and followed Rast's giant slalom victory on the same slope on Saturday.
Switzerland's Wendy Holdener completed the podium, 1.83 seconds off her teammate's pace on the Podkoren 3 piste.
Shiffrin, who also won the last slalom of the 2024-25 season, stayed top of the slalom and overall standings with reigning slalom world champion Rast moving up to second in both.
"Mikaela won five slaloms (this season) and today I made it. It was really not easy but I gave everything I had," said Rast.
Shiffrin had trailed her rival by 0.10 after the first run, with Holdener a distant third, but a storming and flawless second run left her on the brink of a record-extending 107th career success and 70th slalom win.
Rast instead went even faster to claim her career fourth win, and third in slalom, to establish her credentials as the leading Swiss female ski hope for next month's Milano Cortina Olympics and Shiffrin's biggest rival.
"I don't believe it's possible to win every race in the season with the competition level," said Shiffrin, who now has 163 career podiums. "I wanted to give it my best shot but I think that this was a really amazing show today."
U.S. teammate Paula Moltzan finished fourth.
"Clearly Mikaela and Camille are on an entirely different level so it kind of just shows how much room for improvement there is," she said.
Italian-born teenager Lara Colturi, who will be competing for Albania at the Games, fell on the first run and halfway down a course set by her father Alessandro.
Colturi, on the podium in four of the previous five slaloms, appeared unhurt.
Austria's 2021 slalom world champion Katharina Liensberger was absent after having successful knee surgery on Friday following a crash in training that has ruled her out of the Olympics.
"The Olympic season is over," she posted on Instagram.
"I am very happy about all the successes I celebrated in 2021 in Cortina d'Ampezzo and I wish all participants this year the best of luck and injury-free games."
