Alpine World Cup Finals Preview

LENZERHEIDE, Switzerland (March 11) – The March 13-17 Audi FIS Alpine World Cup Finals will cap a record shattering year for the U.S. Alpine Ski Team that has already included 31 World Cup podiums and 16 victories from 10 different athletes. Triple World Champion Ted Ligety (Park City, UT) enters the week having already secured the fourth giant slalom title of his career and stands poised to finish no worse than a career best third in the overall standings. Seventeen-year-old slalom World Champion Mikaela Shiffrin (Eagle-Vail, CO) will enter a winner-take-all battle with Tina Maze for the slalom title, while Julia Mancuso (Squaw Valley, CA) is in a fight with the dominant Slovenian for the super G title.

World Cup Finals reduce the field down to the top 25 in each discipline, giving the year’s beast athletes a chance to take care of unfinished business. Rarely before has so much been at stake for the U.S. Ski Team. In short, every race, every point and every turn count.

Here’s a breakdown of who to watch and why:

Ted Ligety - (Park City, UT)

• Ted recently locked in his fourth Audi FIS Alpine World Cup giant slalom title in the last six years, but is fighting to defend his third overall position like a lone knight defending his maiden’s castle—on skis.
• He has absolutely dominated GS this season, winning five GS races by some of the biggest margins in history.
• He has now been on all eight 2012-13 World Cup GS podiums, the first man to be on the podium for the first eight giant slalom races of a World Cup season since Michael von Grnigen did it in 1995-96.
• He is now the fifth man in history to win at least five giant slalom races in one season, and the first since Hermann Maier in 2000-01. The only others to have achieved this feat are legends Ingemar Stenmark (three times), Michael von Grnigen and Alberto Tomba.
• Ligety has surpassed Tomba, moving into outright third place all-time in men's World Cup giant slalom victories with 16. Stenmark (46) and von Grnigen (23) are the only men with more World Cup giant slalom wins.
• He stands third in overall standings, 922-848 over Felix Neureuther of Germany.
• His World Cup walloping plus his triple gold at the World Championships in Schladming, Austria have put Shred on track for the best season of his career and elevated him to new legend status.

Mikaela Shiffrin – (Eagle-Vail, CO)

• Shiffrin moved down to second place from first in the slalom standings after Sunday’s third place finish in the Ofterschwang slalom.
• She’s only seven points behind Slovenia’s Tina Maze, a gap that could be easily closed with one final slalom victory, which would give Shiffrin the crystal globe.
• After Sunday, she sits eighth in the overall standings in only her second full year on the tour.
• She currently shares the non-European record of three World Cup slalom wins with Tamara McKinney from the U.S. (1982/83) and Claudia Riegler from New Zealand (1996/97).
• In addition to her three World Cup wins, Shiffrin became the slalom World Champion in Schladming, Austria, her first World Champs medal.
• She became the third youngest woman to win a slalom World Championship. She was the youngest American to win a title since 17 year-old (slightly younger) Diann Roffe won gold in giant slalom at Bormio, Italy in 1985.
• She's also the first American to win a Championship or Olympic slalom since Barbara Cochran won at the 1972 Olympics and World Championships in Sapporo.
• Shiffrin has held her position as the Longines Rising Ski Star Leader for months, more than doubling the next best score.
• She turns 18 on March 13 and has proved this season is only the beginning.

Julia Mancuso – (Squaw Valley, CA)

• With four Super G podiums and a World Champs bronze, Mancuso’s has already had her career best SG season.
• She’s currently fourth in the overall standings, but has a chance to jump to third if she can win downhill and Super G in the Lenzerheide, Switzerland.

Other Team Highlights

• The Best in the World women’s speed team is slated to win the nation’s standings for downhill and super G by big margins.
• All six women’s speed athletes have been on World Cup podiums this season, a goal set by the team early in the season.
• It's possible for all six women - Vonn, Mancuso, Cook, McKennis, Smith and Ross - to finish inside the World Cup top 15 for downhill.
• Lindsey Vonn (Vail, CO) continues to lead the downhill standings despite having missed the last two events.

Schedule and starters
Wed. March 13
Men's downhill – Steven Nyman, Marco Sullivan, Travis Ganong, Ted Ligety
Women's downhill – Julia Mancuso, Stacey Cook, Leanne Smith, Laurenne Ross

Thursday, March 14
Men's super G – Ted Ligety
Women's super G – Julia Mancuso, Leanne Smith, Laurenne Ross

Saturday, March 16
Men's giant slalom – Ted Ligety
Women's slalom – Mikaela Shiffrin

Sunday, March 17
Men's slalom – Ted Ligety, David Chodounsky
Women's giant slalom – Julia Mancuso, Mikaela Shiffrin

QUOTES
Ted Ligety
It's cool to go into World Cup Finals without the stress of the giant slalom title, but my goal now is to get third in the overall. Felix [Neureuther] and I have been battling for that position for a little while now and with his giant slalom and slalom power, that's going to be difficult. But hopefully I can ski a good super G and also ski well in the giant slalom and we'll see what happens. I'll ski everything from now until the season is done.

Mikaela Shiffrin
I want the globe, but we’ll see if it works out that way. I’m really excited for Lenzerheide. I trained there a few weeks ago and it is a really awesome hill. It’s always exciting to have the very last race be important to the end. It’s nice to know that in the slalom this year there was a battle for the end and anybody could win.

Julia Mancuso
This is a fun and difficult course. I hope the weather stays good so we can race it. My goal for this season is still to win a race and I feel like if I can do that, then I'll put myself in a good position to challenge for the super G globe. I'm going to fight hard and see what I can do. On this hill you have to be on line and you have to go for it. It's steep and it doesn't let off. You have to be completely committed. 

VIDEO LINKS
Watch Ligety lock in his fourth career Audi FIS Alpine World Cup giant slalom title.
Watch Shiffrin finish third in Ofterschwang, her fifth Audi FIS Alpine World Cup slalom podium of the season.
Watch Mancuso speed into third in the last super G of the season in Garmisch.

LINKS
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