Mikaela Pauline Shiffrin (born March 13, 1995) is an American alpine skier. Shiffrin is the most decorated American alpine skier in World Championships history. She has the most World Cup wins of any alpine skier in history (men or women) and is the only one to have reached the milestone of 100 victories. She is a three-time Olympic gold medalist, four-time Olympic medalist, an eight-time World Championships gold medalist (including four titles in slalom), a six-time overall World Cup champion, and a nine-time winner of the World Cup slalom discipline title. Shiffrin, at 18 years and 345 days, became the youngest slalom gold medalist in Olympic history in 2014.
Shiffrin won her eighth career Alpine world championships gold medal on February 11, 2025, taking her overall tally to 15 medals from 18 career world championship races, and making Shiffrin the most successful skier in the modern era. She was named one of the 100 most influential people in the world by Time magazine in 2023.
Early life Born in Vail, Colorado, Shiffrin is the second child of Eileen (née Condron) and Jeff Shiffrin, both originally from the Northeastern United States and former ski racers; her mother became a nationally prominent masters racer. Her paternal grandfather was Jewish. Shiffrin's father Jeff grew up in New Jersey and was an avid skier on weekends in Vermont with his family. As an undergraduate, he raced for Dartmouth College in New Hampshire. Her mother Eileen raced in high school in northwestern Massachusetts in the Berkshires, and her brother Taylor (born 1992) raced for the University of Denver.
When Mikaela was eight in 2003, the family moved to rural New Hampshire near Lyme, where her father, an anesthesiologist, worked at Dartmouth–Hitchcock Medical Center. After five years, he took a new job in Denver; Shiffrin's older brother Taylor was in high school at Burke Mountain Academy, a ski academy in northeastern Vermont, and stayed in the east. Shiffrin also attended middle school at Burke but went with her parents to Colorado before returning to Burke.
From a young age, Mikaela had strong results in major competitions. In March 2010, at age 14, she won both the slalom and giant slalom (GS) at the Topolino Games in Italy, against skiers from 40 nations. The following winter, now meeting the FIS minimum age requirement of 15 years, she won a Nor-Am Cup super combined race in December 2010 at Panorama, British Columbia, only the eighth FIS-level race in which she had competed. Shiffrin followed it up with three podiums in her next three Nor-Am races: runner-up in a super-G, third in a GS, and victory in a slalom. Weeks later, she won a pair of Nor-Am slalom races held at Sunday River, Maine. A month later, Shiffrin took the slalom bronze medal at the FIS Junior World Ski Championships held at Crans-Montana, Switzerland (after having been down with a stomach virus the day before).
Personal life In February 2020, her father unexpectedly died in an accident. Since 2021, Shiffrin has been in a relationship with the Norwegian World Cup alpine ski racer Aleksander Aamodt Kilde. On April 4, 2024, the couple announced their engagement.
In May 2025, Shiffrin joined the ownership group for National Women's Soccer League expansion club Denver Summit FC. In June 2025, she received an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Dartmouth College.
Ski racing career Shiffrin made her World Cup debut on March 11, 2011, in giant slalom at Špindlerův Mlýn in the Czech Republic. In early April, just a few weeks after her 16th birthday, she won the slalom title at the US National Championships at Winter Park, Colorado, and became the youngest American ski racer to claim a national alpine crown.Alpine Young Guns: Mikaela Shiffrin , International Ski Federation, Oberhofen/Thunersee, Switzerland: International Ski Federation (FIS), 2011.
2012 season
During the 2012 Alpine Skiing World Cup, Shiffrin, age 16, took her first World Cup podium on December 29, 2011, at a slalom in Lienz, Austria. She started 40th, lost her left shin guard halfway down, but finished in 12th place in the first run. Shiffrin then posted the fastest time in the second run to secure third place.FIS Results – World Cup – women's slalom – December 29, 2011Universal Sports – video – Mikaela Shiffrin – first World Cup podium – December 29, 2011
2013 season Shiffrin won her first World Cup race in December 2012 at age 17, in a night slalom in Åre, Sweden. She became the second-youngest American to win an alpine World Cup event, behind Judy Nagel (17 yr, 5 mo.). Shiffrin's second win came two weeks later at a night slalom at Zagreb, Croatia, and her third win 11 days later at another night slalom in Flachau, Austria. After winning the slalom at the World Cup finals in Lenzerheide, she secured the 2013 season title in the slalom discipline. Though she spent most of her last two years of high school in Europe on the World Cup circuit, she graduated on time from Burke Mountain Academy in June.
2014 season
Shiffrin opened the 2014 season in October 2013 in Sölden, Austria, with a career-best sixth in giant slalom, within a half-second of the podium. She won the next event, a slalom at Levi, Finland, improving on her podium finish the previous year for her fifth World Cup victory. At Beaver Creek, she was runner-up in the giant slalom, her first World Cup podium in that discipline. On January 5, Shiffrin secured first place in a two-run slalom race in Bormio, Italy (the race took place there instead of in Zagreb, as scheduled, due to bad snow/weather conditions). She also won the world cup slalom races in Flachau, Åre, and Lenzerheide to secure a second consecutive World Cup slalom title. On February 21, she won slalom at the Sochi Olympics, becoming the youngest winner of that Olympic event. Shiffrin ended the season as the reigning Olympic, World Cup, and world champion in slalom. That year, she was named one of ESPNW's Impact 25.
2015 season Shiffrin opened the 2015 season in October 2014 in Sölden with her first World Cup win in giant slalom. She had some trouble with slalom at first and ended up outside the podium in the first three World Cup slalom races, but emerged victorious in the races at Kühtai, Zagreb, Maribor, Åre and Méribel. She ended up winning the slalom world cup title once again. Shiffrin also won the World Championship in slalom held in Beaver Creek next to her home city of Vail, Colorado, U.S.
2016 season In the first two slalom races of the 2016 season, both in Aspen, Shiffrin won by large margins, and in her first race, she achieved a new record margin for women's slalom, 3.07 seconds over the runner-up. On December 12, 2015, during the warm-up for the giant slalom in Åre, she fell and injured her knee. After two months away from racing, Shiffrin made a successful return in her first race back on February 15, 2016, where she took her 18th victory in Crans-Montana. In the 2016 season, she won all five slaloms she started. She missed the other five slaloms due to injuries and chose not to compete in parallel slalom in Stockholm.
2017 season Shiffrin opened the 2017 season with a second-place finish in giant slalom at Sölden in October 2016. This was followed by a victory in slalom at Levi on November 12. On November 26, 2016, she finished fifth in giant slalom at Killington in her first World Cup race in Vermont, but she returned the following day to a first-place finish in the slalom. On December 11, 2016, Shiffrin won her 11th straight World Cup in the slalom in Sestriere, Italy. On December 27, Shiffrin won the giant slalom in Semmering, Austria, her second career giant slalom win and her first solo giant slalom win. The next day, she repeated and won her third career giant slalom and 25th World cup career victory. Shiffrin subsequently won the final race held at Semmering, a slalom, on December 29, 2016, achieving her 26th World cup victory and completing her sweep of races at the resort. This made her the first woman to take three wins in three consecutive days in technical disciplines since Vreni Schneider won two giant slaloms in Schwarzenberg and a slalom in Mellau in January 1989. However she missed out on equalling the record of eight consecutive slalom wins, jointly held by Schneider and Janica Kostelić when she failed to finish the first run of the Snow Queen Trophy race in Zagreb on January 3 – her first DNF in slalom since a race in Semmering in 2012. On January 29 in Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy, Shiffrin posted her best result in a speed event, finishing fourth in the super-G, only 0.03 seconds off the podium. She won her first parallel slalom on January 31 in Stockholm, Sweden.
At the World Championships in St. Moritz in February, she won the gold medal in slalom and took the silver in giant slalom. The gold was her third consecutive in slalom at the World Championships; she became the first woman to do this in the World Cup era and the first since Germany's Christl Cranz in 1939 when the Worlds were held annually.
On February 26, Shiffrin won her first super combined race at Crans-Montana. In Squaw Valley, the first World Cup races there since 1969, she won the giant slalom on March 10 and the slalom the following day, taking her to 31 World Cup victories and 11 for the season. This secured her fourth slalom world cup. In Aspen, Colorado, the World Cup finals of the season took place. Shiffrin secured her first overall World Cup but did not win the giant slalom World Cup that year. She finished the season with more World Cup victories before the age of 22 than Ingemar Stenmark, the record holder for number of World Cup victories. After the season, she received the "Skieur d'Or" (golden skier) award, given by the international ski journalist association to the best alpine skier of the year (one award for both genders).
2018 season
In January, with wins in both the giant slalom and slalom at Kranjska Gora, Slovenia, Shiffrin clocked up her 39th, and 40th World Cup wins at age 22. She then tied the record of 41 World Cup wins before a 23rd birthday. She also became the first woman in history to win the first 5 World Cup races of a calendar year.
At the 2018 Winter Olympics, in Pyeongchang, South Korea, Shiffrin won gold in giant slalom as well as silver in combined.
Shiffrin secured her second consecutive World Cup overall title on March 9, 2018, with 5 races left in the season.
2019 season On December 2, 2018, she won a super-G race in Lake Louise, becoming the only alpine skier ever — male or female — to win all six currently contested alpine skiing disciplines. These include slalom, giant slalom, downhill, super-G, combined, and parallel slalom.
On December 8, 2018, she won her second Super-G at St. Moritz, Switzerland, for her first back-to-back speed wins. The next day, December 9, she won her 4th parallel slalom with a dramatic win over her main slalom rival, the Slovak Petra Vlhová. This marked her 5th win out of 9 season races to start the 2018–2019 season. On December 22, 2018, she won the slalom in Courchevel, France, and became the youngest skier, female or male, to win 50 World Cup ski races at 23 years and nine months. With that race, she also equaled the record of the Austrian Marlies Schild for the most wins in women's slalom – 35.
One week later, she took another World Cup slalom win in Semmering, Austria, becoming the first alpine skier to take 15 World Cup wins in a single calendar year, moving ahead of Marcel Hirscher, who had taken 14 wins in 2018: both had broken the old record of 13 wins which had been set by Ingemar Stenmark in 1979. The race was also her 36th World Cup slalom win, breaking Schild's record: Shiffrin subsequently described Schild as "my biggest idol beside Bode Miller".