Mikaela Shiffrin and Breezy Johnson make a great team.
Shiffrin and Johnson won the inaugural team combined event at the world championships on Tuesday, finishing 0.39 seconds ahead of Switzerland. Austria took the bronze medal, and Lauren Macuga and Paula Moltzan were fourth.
It’s the second gold of these worlds for Johnson, who won the downhill Saturday. It’s also the third medal in as many events for the U.S. women after Macuga won bronze in the super-G.
“She’s such a legend,” Johnson said of Shiffrin, whose 99 World Cup victories are more than any other skier, male or female. “It’s super cool to be hitting my stride and she’s obviously been on hers for a decade or more.”
The team combined is one run by a speed skier and the second by a technical specialist. Johnson posted the fourth-fastest run in the downhill, finishing 0.51 seconds behind Macuga.
But with Shiffrin as her partner, that was a wide opening.
Shiffrin came out blazing, sluicing her way through the gates on the upper part of the course. She got a little loose toward the bottom, but pulled it together to finish strong. Johnson and Shiffrin’s combined time of 2:40.89 put them in first, but with teams from Austria, Germany and the United States still to go, they had to wait to see if it would stand up.
It did.
“This was an amazing day,” Shiffrin said. “For me, up there it was nerve-wracking because Breezy did her job spectacularly. … Really, really unbelievable. Just happy.”
It’s the eighth gold medal at the world championships for Shiffrin and 15th overall, and she’s not done yet. Shiffrin pulled out of the giant slalom, citing lingering PTSD from a crash in Killington, Vermont, earlier this season that left a deep gash in her obliques, but she will race in the individual slalom on Saturday.
