Mikaela Shiffrin plans to shift focus from slalom races to giant slalom, super-G events this season

Two-time Olympic slalom champion Mikaela Shiffrin will shift her focus from that discipline this season to turn more of her attention toward training for giant slalom and super-G events.

The ski racer from Colorado announced her strategy Tuesday in what she describes as a season of "exploration.” It's part of her plan to push herself coming off a season where she won her second Olympic gold in slalom at the Milan Cortina Games and earned her ninth World Cup season title in the discipline.

The season kicks off on Oct. 24 with a giant slalom race in Soelden, Austria. Shiffrin said her first slalom race is expected to be in Killington, Vermont, over Thanksgiving weekend and she will proceed from there.

“I’m not trying to do less because I care less. I’m trying to do something different because I still care SO much,” the 31-year-old Shiffrin said in a statement. ”The joy for me has never been about medals or records.

"This season is an exploration. We’re calling it the exploration season.”

Shiffrin won her sixth overall World Cup title by 87 points over Emma Aicher of Germany. Shiffrin also won the crystal globe in the slalom by beating Camille Rast of Switzerland.

In the giant slalom standings Shiffrin was fourth, while winding up outside the top 30 in the super-G. Her last World Cup win in the super-G, an event that blends the speed of a downhill with the turns of a GS, was in December 2022. She won a downhill event in 2023.

“Racing slalom underprepared would be like jumping into a giant blender and just trying to avoid the blades,” Shiffrin said. "I’m trying a little bit more to live in the gratitude of it and ski because I want to ski. ... I’m not looking for less commitment. I’m not looking for actually even less effort.”

She added: “I feel ambitious. I still feel competitive. I feel like I have a desire to ski fast. I feel like those things haven’t changed. I’m really just giving myself permission to be curious about where that takes me, and that’s the exploration.”

Shiffrin also plans to continue to work on her podcast , “What’s the Point with Mikaela Shiffrin.”

See AP’s full Alpine skiing coverage here