Title duel between Aicher and Shiffrin: A last look into the big crystal ball

SIt is 46 centimeters high, weighs twelve kilograms and is commonly referred to as a large crystal ball. From a German perspective, a detailed look at this transparent ski trophy has recently been of little importance. Since Viktoria Rebensburg’s third place overall in the winter of 2017/18, no German skier has even come close to this trophy. But now that a certain Emma Aicher is plowing tirelessly through the slopes of this ski world, it’s worth taking a closer look – and into the crystal ball.

Ski and sports enthusiasts have been excited for weeks about this unexpected duel for this unwieldy trophy: Mikaela Shiffrin, USA, against Emma Aicher, Germany. The preliminary decision in the women’s ski world cup could have been made on Tuesday afternoon. The 31-year-old Shiffrin did her part of the work reliably and seriously. In the slalom in Hafjell near Lillehammer she once again cruised through the gates on her own time. She won a ski race for the 110th time in her career and once again made the rest of the scene look like extras. The 22-year-old Aicher, for her part, left a very good record of work, came third on the day – and created a showdown for herself and Shiffrin that the American would probably have been happy to do without.

Shiffrin was ahead with 449 World Cup points just seven weeks ago. There was never any talk of a duel with Aicher; one would have expected the Swiss Camille Rast to have one. As time went on, however, the woman with the cheeky grin stalked record winner Shiffrin no less boldly and persistently. So close that looking at the numbers recently became a journeyman’s piece for young mathematicians. The starting position before the slalom looked like this: If Shiffrin won, Aicher would have to finish at least fourth in order to postpone the decision on overall victory. Already fifth place would have meant: 100 points behind, no longer able to catch up, since if there was a tie, the more races won would have been in Shiffrin’s favor.

Mikaela Shiffrin could draw level with Annemarie Moser-Pröll, the Austrian won six times between 1970 and 1980

The new starting position after the slalom and before the final in the giant slalom on Wednesday: Shiffrin (1386) is 85 points ahead of Aicher (1301) and now seems to have an easy time getting her lead across the finish line. To have a chance, Aicher must win the last race – something she has never achieved in the giant slalom before. Should she achieve her debut victory in this discipline, Shiffrin would be challenged in her less strong technical discipline. She would then have to finish at least 15th, would collect 16 points for this performance and would have 1402 points in the final tally, while Aicher would only get 1401 points. This scenario would be the closest in history, even closer than the last victory by a German to date: in 2010/11, Maria Riesch (1728) ended up with three points more than Lindsey Vonn (1725).

In other words: It is not realistic that Shiffrin would be spared having to lift the 46 centimeter high and twelve kilogram crystal structure for the sixth time. She would then draw level with Annemarie Moser-Pröll, the Austrian had won six times between 1970 and 1980, more often than anyone else. But Shiffrin has rarely had to fight for it like he did this winter. And, it should at least be mentioned: Aicher has recently had the so-called hundredth of bad luck in crucial moments. She was 0.01 seconds short of winning the downhill in Val di Fassa and 0.01 seconds short of third place in the Super-G in Kvitfjell. Before the slalom in Hafjell, the Swiss Wendy Holdener crossed the finish line 0.04 seconds ahead of Aicher, making her second.

If you like, six hundredths of a second cost Aicher the equivalent of 50 World Cup points. In the slalom, Shiffrin shows how to avoid such narrow point losses: she simply drives one or two seconds faster than everyone else.

Aicher liked the second run, it was “just for skipping through.”

Aicher herself had never commented publicly on scores, calculation games or overall chances of victory in the past few days – even on Tuesday she limited herself to a short sporting analysis. “The first run was sluggish, I had a hard time moving forward,” said Aicher, who actually carved through the gates more lively and smoothly in the final round. “In the second, the run was nicer to drive, it was just fun to skip through.”

Eight out of ten crystal balls are awarded in the ski world, Shiffrin was presented with the small ball in the pole forest after nine victories in ten Slalom World Cups. Shortly before, the penultimate decision for the men had been made in the ski stadium. Lucas Pinheiro Braathen, who competes for Brazil, won the men’s giant slalom and passed the Swiss Marco Odermatt, who was eliminated in run one, in his native country. The DSV starters Anton Grammel, Fabian Gratz and Jonas Stockinger finished in seventh, tenth and eleventh place – Gratz came eleventh overall in the discipline. The best men’s slalom skier will be determined on Wednesday: two final balls are still up for grabs, on the last day in the final act before the curtain closes on the Alpine stage.