(Mont-Tremblant) “So she skis at home and the pressure doesn’t seem to be suffocating her,” we could read in the sports section of La Presse on November 25, 2016. Nothing could be more false. Literally.
At 21, Mikaela Shiffrin was preparing to compete in the first World Cup in history in Killington, Vermont. The American skier had spent half her life in the region, attending high school at Burke Mountain Academy, a renowned boarding school located two hours away, near the Canadian border.
The youngest Olympic gold medalist in alpine skiing, double world champion in slalom, she was already rewriting the record books in her fifth season on the circuit. Two days before the first event in Killington, where 30,000 people came to cheer her on, including her 95-year-old grandmother, she joked and let herself be photographed with young supporters at the bottom of the course.
Between the two rounds of the slalom, which she won by a landslide, she felt gagging, wanted to cry and was prey to panic attacks.
“Honestly, I almost went home that day because I was so distraught,” she told Time magazine a year later. “Rather than answering questions, I started hearing myself answer them,” she explained to Sports Illustrated. Despite her unprecedented successes, it took her a few years to emerge from this negative spiral.
After becoming the winningest skier in history last winter, Shiffrin added a 90th success to her incredible record by winning the Killington slalom on Sunday.
This Friday afternoon, the 28-year-old athlete will participate in the opening press conference of the Tremblant World Cup, the first in 30 years in Quebec. She will be accompanied by Valérie Grenier, the best Canadian skier, who will have the pleasure of competing on her land for two giant slaloms, Saturday and Sunday.
At 27, Grenier has competed in the Olympics twice and has 102 World Cup starts. Recurring ankle pain and a serious leg injury at the 2019 World Championships significantly slowed the development of the downhill gold medalist at the 2016 Junior Worlds.
Finally in good health, the Franco-Ontarian from Saint-Isidore had her best season last winter, signing her first victory on the circuit in January and winning bronze in the parallel team event at the World Championships in Courchevel Méribel. With her second podium in her last start, she concluded the campaign in seventh place. She continued her momentum by finishing seventh (Sölden) and fifth (Killington) at her first two giants this season.
“I don’t know yet, I guess we’ll see it there,” she replied after training in Saint-Sauveur on Tuesday morning. “The Olympics are very special, they only happen every four years. It’s a lot of stress, but I didn’t feel that much. Honestly, I’m not the type of person who experiences a lot of stress. It’s still quite small. It doesn’t affect me too much at the moment, even for Tremblant. So far, I’m just really excited to go shopping. I’m really looking forward to it and I only have a little bit of racing stress, but really minimal. »
She calculates that around thirty members of her family will come to encourage her, including her 84-year-old maternal grandfather, Marcel Bourdon, with whom she took up the boards when she was still practically in childbirth. You also have to count friends, the ski community and… thousands of spectators.
This is no reason to worry, believes Grenier, well aware of what Shiffrin experienced in her early days at Killington, since she was there herself, scoring her first points in technical events (24th of the giant, 29th in the slalom).
“It’s not worth putting that kind of pressure on yourself. […] For now, I’m trying not to worry about it. I know what I have to do; I just want to ski and do my things well. That’s it. There’s no point in thinking too much about results and everything else. »
Stoneham’s Sarah Bennett is another competitor who is heading into this World Cup feeling like it’s home.
“I’ve been coming to Tremblant every year since I was 12,” recalled the 22-year-old athlete, who will be making his ninth start on the circuit on Saturday. “The environment is very familiar. I just feel so good at home. It’s like I was going to do the Tremblant Super Series! The feeling is really similar. »
His parents, his sister, his grandmother and representatives of his three sponsors will be on hand to support him. By announcing her participation on social networks, the communications student at Concordia was nevertheless surprised to see the number of acquaintances who notified her of their presence. “The way I see it, there will be more than I think. »
Could this increased attention destabilize her? “No, for me, it’s really the opposite,” assured Sarah Bennett. They’re not necessarily there just for me. »
If the butterflies ever become too overwhelming, she will turn to advice sent to her by a friend, professional cyclist Magnus Sheffield, a very promising American who plays for the Ineos Grenadiers team. “He told me, ‘They’re there to see you, you just have to accept with open arms that they’re there for you.’” It just gives a little more comfort. »
Mikaela Shiffrin received a message of the same essence from a fan during her second participation in the World Cup in Killington, in 2017. On Instagram, he let her know that he could feel the pressure that was nagging at her insides, and that everyone was just happy to see her hurtling down the courses at home. “Whatever happens, we have your back,” he concluded. “That’s when I realized no one really cared! “, she recounted two years later.
Entering her 12th World Cup season, Mikaela Shiffrin has learned to deal with her personal demons. Very affected by the sudden death of her father in 2020, the skier from Vail is among the internationally renowned athletes who have been the most open about their mental health issues.
Over time, she understood that the success of her local World Cup did not rest on her shoulders. Even the one time she didn’t win, in 2022, people had fun.
“They have a good time no matter what,” she added at a press conference last week. They really want to see good skiing, a good show. They are ski racing fans and they want to see good races. »
It shouldn’t be too different in Tremblant.