Skiing great Mikaela Shiffrin scooped up her 98th World Cup win at the annual slalom in Levi, Finland over the weekend – and bagged herself her eight reindeer as a reward.
The 29-year-old skier already holds the most World Cup wins of any alpine skier in history, and won the slalom – a ski race down a winding course marked by poles – by just 79 hundredths of a second over second-placed Austrian Katharina Liensberger in combined times from two runs in only the second race of the season.
"98 is here. Mikaela Shiffrin has won, and won in style," writes the Stifer US Ski Team on Instagram, along with a video which you can watch below showing the two-time Olympic champion dominating the Levi Black run.
Earlier this year, Shiffrin was forced to sit out a slalom due to injuries sustained in a crash in January, but she quickly returned to full form with a win in Sweden in March.
"This venue is always a special one for me, and the timing always makes me reflect about all the things I’m grateful for—my family, team, this sport, the fans, my sponsors, Santa," writes Shiffrin over on her own Instagram page where she shared a picture of herself with Rori the reindeer.
A reindeer is the traditional prize for the winner of the Levi World Cup (in addition to 54,000 Swiss Francs, which works out to about $60,800), though the animal remains in Finland and the skier only gets to name it.
Shiffin explains the name is short for Aurora Borealis, which she tells Swiss broadcaster SRF she got to see during her time in Finland. The skier named her previous reindeer Rudolph, Sven, Mr. Gru, Ingemar, Sunny, Lorax and Grogu. Just one more Levin win and she'll have as many reindeer as Santa.
The Vail, Colorado-based skiing legend is on her first slalom-winning streak since 2019, having bagged her last five slalom starts.
In other big news from the US Ski Team, Lindsay Vonn announced her shock return after a five-year retirement on Friday, signaling an exciting season for winter sports enthusiasts.
