Industry News
Team USA has announced its teams for the Alpine Team Combined at the 2025 World Championships in Saalbach-Hinterglemm, Austria, and the announcement has raised some eyebrows amongst skiers and spectators. U.S. Ski and Snowboard will send a total of six teams into the Alpine Team Combined on February 11 and 12. The Alpine Combined is a new team event in which a speed skier is paired with a tech specialist and the combined time of a Downhill and a Slalom race will determine the winning team.
Competing in the women’s event, Team USA will have four teams, with team 1 consisting of Breezy Johnson, who will do the Downhill part, and Mikaela Shiffrin, who will compete in the Slalom race. The pairing of Shiffrin and Johnson comes just days after Shiffrin had announced she would not attend the Alpine Team Combined event and would focus on Giant Slalom training instead. Today, the U.S. ski racer announced on her social media channels that she would not be competing in the Giant Slalom at Saalbach due to “mental obstacles” following her crash in Killington, Vermont. The 29-year-old admits to struggling with PTSD after the Giant Slalom crash in November last year and that she simply was experiencing fear instead of joy during Giant Slalom training. Shiffrin admits that the experience had been “soul-crushing.” Instead, the Colorado native added, this “re-opens up the opportunity for me to join my teammates in the Team Combined. I’d feel lucky and grateful to partner with any of my incredible Speed teammates—and our coaches have now informed us that Breezy and I will paired together for the event.”
The announcement that Shiffrin was paired with Breezy Johnson and not legendary Lindsey Vonn caused some consternation in Vonn, who had expressed keen interest in competing with Shiffrin. “Why am I not surprised?” Vonn wrote her Twitter (X) account with a shrug emoji. Vonn then deleted the message and instead wrote “Always been a team player and I support my team no matter what. I’m not surprised by the decisions made but at least now it’s clear that it’s not my decision. I have always been supportive and respectful and that will never change.” In a statement to the Associated Press, Vonn stated: “I’m excited for Breezy and Mikaela to team up together and I believe they are a great pair. However, I am disappointed in the way it was handled.”
Team USA meanwhile emphasized that team pairings were made based on “data-driven selection criteria for the team combined, which includes matching the top downhill skier with the top slalom skier based off of season-best results, then moving down the list of athletes to create four potential teams.” Vonn has been paired with AJ Hurt as Team 3, while speed specialist Lauren Macuga has been paired with Slalom skier Paula Moltzan as Team 2, and Jackie Wiles will race as Downhill partner of Slalom skier Katie Hensien. Considering Johnson and Shiffrin have been the only U.S. skiers to win in their respective discipline this season, their pairing seems straight forward. However, a different approach could possibly have been a pairing by FIS points for the season, in which case Shiffrin would still not have been paired with Vonn but rather with Macuga, who has 134 FIS points in Downhill while Johnson has 103 points.
Meanwhile, U.S. Ski and Snowboard is sending two men’s teams into the Alpine Team Combined, with Team 1 consisting of the pairing of speed expert Ryan Cochran-Siegle and Slalom specialist Benjamin Ritchie, and Team 2 comprised of Bryce Bennett and Jett Seymour. “I think it will be really cool to have this experience with another teammate,” said Cochran-Siegle. “Skiing is a very individual sport but we also spend so much time as a team working together, so being at the bottom and cheering on your teammate will be really unique.”
While the pairing of Vonn and Shiffrin would have been a legendary combination, with a total of 181 World Cup victories between both skiers, the season-performance based teams as announced today will certainly make for strong teams for Team USA.
The team sponsor that puts it’s name all over everything, usually at the top, has been promoting the super stars shamelessly. Von, Shiffrin and the rest are pawns in their game. The company pays up to sponsor the team, athletes go along with it, they know sponsors are part of modern ski racing. But it’s a bad image. As a few corporations buy up ski areas and the sport is more expensive than ever it’s isn’t surprising that a business focused on “wealth management” is now the US teams top sponsor. Vonn’s comeback is fascinating, she’s a fantastic athlete, and it’s no surprise the media trips over itself to take advantage of the spectacle. I wonder if the “dream team” hype was actually Lindsey’s idea or was it cooked up by the PR and media people.
Lindsey needs to earn her spot on the team . To show up , and demand to ski with the best , before posting top results , is entitlement at its finest . You were a great champion . Don’t ruin the memory now !
So true. This headline is very misleading creating the thought that either Mikaela or Lindsey had the power to create the team matchups. That’s coaching’s job, not the athlete. The media who keep pushing this concept, in headline form or poorly written AI articles. (not this one ), that they could pick their partners is just wrong. Lindsey feeding that concept with her comments is wildly misguided but it does produce clicks and there’s now a much bigger part of me that thinks that’s Lindsey’s goal. I was all for her comeback, especially as a 64 year old still racing beer league.