The US won their most ever medals in alpine skiing in Vancouver with eight. That was compared to just 11 medals over the previous six Olympics. Will the US be able to continue their great performances in alpine skiing or will they revert to their form over much of the last two decades? Some of their recent results and their experience would seem to indicate good results could be on the way.
Alpine Skiing’s Olympic History
Alpine Skiing is not one of the original Winter Olympic sports having made its debut in 1936 with both a men’s and women’s combined event. It expanded to three events for each gender in the next winter Olympics in 1948 and finally in 1988 to the five events for each gender that are still contested today.
25 nations have medaled in alpine skiing but no one has more medals than Austria with 105 of the 397 awarded. The US ranks fourth with 39 medals and their 14 golds are also the 4th most all time.
How the Alpine Skiing Competitions Work
The differences between the different skiing events largely is in the area of how far the gates are spread out, how long the courses are, and how many runs the athletes get.
In the downhill event the course is at its longest and the gates are at their farthest apart. The athletes go the fastest in this event and the gates are the most spaced out. In fact you might not even realize the athletes are going through the gates on this one as they’ll follow a path of blue lines on the slope that help direct them down the correct path. This event is just one race, best time wins.
The slalom event looks completely different and for good reason. This is an event with much shorter distances between gates causing the athletes to cut back and forth a lot more. It’s a much slower speed event and features “gates” that are more like poles sticking up which the athletes can easily bump over and will bounce back up. This event is done over two runs with the times added to get the final standings.
Now that I’ve told you of two wildly different events you are of course thinking it’d be a good idea to combine them into one event. That is the combined event where one run is done on the downhill course while the other is a slalom run. It’s a difficult test of athletes involving two very different types of skiing.
The giant slalom event is similar to the slalom event but on a course with gates spaced further apart. The speeds are higher on this course and the athletes get two runs which will be combined to get a total time.
The super g on the other hand is an event that is actually closer to the downhill in many ways. The speeds are much higher again though turning is a bigger part of super g than it is in downhill. Each athlete only gets one run at the super g course.
US Team
The team is made up of 11 men and nine women. Ten of the athletes are returning from Vancouver, six were part of the team in Turin, three were part of the team in Salt Lake City and one is going to his fifth Olympics having been part of the team all the way back in Nagano as well.
Links are to twitter accounts for the athletes.
US Alpine Skiing
Men:
David Chodounsky
Erik Fisher
Travis Ganong
Jared Goldberg
Tim Jitloff
Nolan Kasper*
Ted Ligety**
Bode Miller****
Steven Nyman**
Marco Sullivan^
Andrew Weibrecht*
Women:
Stacey Cook**
Julia Ford
Julia Mancuso***
Megan McJames*
Laurenne Ross
Mikaela Shiffrin
Leanne Smith*
Resi Stiegler&
Jacqueline Wiles
* – Was on team in Vancouver
** – Was on team in Vancouver & Turin
& – Was on team in Turin
*** – Was on team in Vancouver, Turin, and Salt Lake City
^ – Was on team in Vancouver and Salt Lake City
**** – Was on team in Vancouver, Turin, Salt Lake City, and Nagano
A Sochi 2014 Alpine Skiing list on twitter including all of these athletes
US Team’s Olympic History
Nolan Kasper made his Olympic debut for the US in Vancouver competing in the slalom event. Kasper finished his first run in 29th but improved in his second run with a 23rd place finish to end up 24th overall.
Ted Ligety came to the Vancouver Olympics as a veteran and competed in four events. He did not finish the slalom event and finished 19th in the super-g event. He came close though in other events as he finished ninth in the giant slalom and fifth in the combined event. In his first Olympics in Turin Ligety won a gold medal in the combined event while not finishing the giant slalom and being disqualified in the slalom event.
Bode Miller was one of the US stars in Vancouver. Miller medaled three times as he won the combined event, finished second in the super-g, and won the bronze in the downhill. Miller was unable to finish in the giant slalom or the slalom events. In Turin, Milller was one of the US favorites but disappointed finishing in fifth in the downhill and sixth in the giant slalom. He was also disqualified in the combined and did not finish in the slalom and super-g events. Miller’s reputation coming into Turin was due to the fact that he won two silvers in Salt Lake City, in giant slalom and combined. Miller also came in 24th in the slalom event. Bode Miller’s debut came in Nagano but he didn’t finish either of his two events. He was disqualified in the giant slalom and did not finish the slalom event.
Vancouver was the second Olympics for Steven Nyman. Nyman competed in the downhill event and he finished 20th. Nyman was a competitor in three events for the US in Turin. Nyman’s best result came in the downhill where he finished 19th. He also came in 29th in the combined event and 43rd in the super-g.
Marco Sullivan returned to the Olympics in Vancouver after missing out on the team in Turin. Sullivan competed in two events, finishing 60th in the downhill and 23rd in the super-g. Sullivan was part of the team in Salt Lake City competing in two events. Sullivan did not finish the super-g but came in ninth in the downhill.
Vancouver was the Olympic debut of Andrew Weibrecht where he competed in three events. The best result for Weibrecht was in the super-g where he finished just behind teammate Bode Miller and won the bronze medal. Weibrecht also finished 11th in the combined and 21st in the downhill.
Stacey Cook competed in her second Olympics for the US in Vancouver. Cook took part in one event, the downhill, where she finished 11th. Cook’s debut in Turin saw her compete in the downhill where she finished 19th and the giant slalom where she finished 23rd.
Julia Mancuso was a double medalist for the US in Vancouver winning silvers in both the downhill and combined events. Mancuso had two other top-ten finishes, eighth in the giant slalom and ninth in the super-g. Mancuso competed in four events in Turin and won a gold medal in giant slalom. Mancuso’s other events were the downhill (seventh), combined (ninth), and super-g (11th). Mancuso’s debut came in Salt Lake City when she competed in the combined event finishing 13th.
Megan McJames made her Olympic debut in Vancouver when she competed in the giant slalom and slalom events. McJames wasn’t able to finish the slalom event but did come in 32nd in the giant slalom event.
Another first time Olympian in Vancouver was Leanne Smith. Smith competed in the super-g where she finished 18th and in the combined where she finished 21st.
Resi Stiegler didn’t make the team for Vancouver but she was part of the team back in Turin. In Turin Stiegler was 11th in the combined event and finished 12th in the slalom.
Schedule
All Times ET, * indicates medals awarded
Sunday, February 9th
*2 AM – Men’s Downhill
Monday, February 10th
2 AM – Women’s Super Combined Downhill
*6 AM – Women’s Super Combined Slalom
Wednesday, February 12th
*2 AM – Women’s Downhill
Friday, February 14th
2 AM – Men’s Super Combined Downhill
*6:30 AM – Men’s Super Combined Slalom
Saturday, February 15th
*2 AM – Women’s Super-G
Sunday, February 16th
*2 AM – Men’s Super-G
Tuesday, February 18th
2 AM – Women’s Giant Slalom Run 1
*5:30 AM – Women’s Giant Slalom Run 2
Wednesday, February 19th
2 AM – Men’s Giant Slalom Run 1
*5:30 AM – Men’s Giant Slalom Run 2
Friday, February 21st
7:45 AM – Women’s Slalom Run 1
*11:15 AM – Women’s Slalom Run 2
Saturday, February 22nd
7:45 AM – Men’s Slalom Run 1
*11:15 AM – Men’s Slalom Run 2
US Team’s Recent World Championship History
Alpine Skiing’s world championship is the FIS Alpine World Ski Championships, most recently held in February 2013 in Schladming, Austria.
The men’s downhill event featured four US Olympians. Two of them, Marco Sullivan and Travis Ganong, did not finish the event while Steven Nyman finished 25th and Andrew Weibrecht finished 22nd.
The men’s super combined only involved one of the US Olympians from this year, Ted Ligety, but Ligety stole the show for the US by wining the race by over a second.
Two Americans were in the men’s giant slalom event with Ted Jitloff finishing in 16th. Once again though Ligety was the start with another world championship, again by almost a second.
Two Olympians were part of the US team in the slalom event, but both Ted Ligety and David Chodounsky did not finish the race.
Ted Ligety won his 3rd event at the world championships in the super-g, though this time by just a fifth of a second. The only other Olympian in the field for the US was Andrew Weibrecht who did not finish.
On the women’s side in the super combined four Olympians competed (Julia Mancuso, Stacey Cook, Laurenne Ross, and Leanne Smith) and all had great downhill runs placing in the top 20. Smith was the best of all in 12th after the downhill but she didn’t complete the slalom portion. Cook came in 18th, Ross came in 11th while Mancuso was 8th.
The downhill event also featured American threatening to medal, but once again none did. Julia Mancuso came closest in fifth place with Stacey Cook right behind her in sixth. Both were within a second of the winner. Leanne Smith came in 12th for the US.
Three Americans also competed in the giant slalom event. This time the top American was Mikaela Shiffrin who came in sixth. Julia Mancuso came in 22nd while Laurenne Ross finished the first run 35th but didn’t finish the second run.
Mikaela Shiffrin was again the top American in the slalom event, this time taking the event for the US. The only other American in the field was Resi Stiegler who finished 22nd but had the eighth best second run.
Finally in the super-g Julia Mancuso medaled for the US with a third place finish while Leannne Smith came in 16th and Laurenne Ross was 26th.
US Olympic History
The men’s downhill event has been home to very few medals for the US. They won golds in 1984 and 1994 while Bode Miller grabbed Bronze in 2010. Outside of that the US has not medaled in the event.
The slalom event has seen five more medals for the US all-time, but none have been won since 1984. While four Americans competed in Vancouver only one finished (Nolan Kasper) and he finished 24th.
The giant slalom event has been held 16 times with the US only grabbing one medal, a silver by Bode Miller in Salt Lake City. The US did have a top-ten finish in Vancouver with Ted Ligety finishing 9th.
The super-g has only been held seven times but the US has three medals. They have not won a gold yet but are coming off of a silver (Bode Miller) and a bronze (Andrew Weibrecht) in Vancouver.
The US didn’t win a medal in the first six combined events, however they have now medaled in three straight games. That includes golds in the last two Olympics by Ted Ligety (Turin) and Bode Miller (Vancouver).
In the women’s downhill the US has won seven medals and won their first ever gold in Vancouver thanks to Lindsey Vonn. Julia Mancuso’s silver made it the first Olympics they had won multiple medals in the downhill in.
The US won the slalom event three times and has five total medals, but they haven’t won a medal since 1972. 2010 saw two Americans fail to finish while the best American came in 16th (Sarah Schleper).
The US has seven all-time medals in the giant slalom with the most recent a gold by Julia Mancuso in 2006. Mancuso was the top American again in Vancouver, finishin in eighth.
The US has three medals in the seven all-time super-g events. They won back-to-back golds in 1994 and 1998 but haven’t won the gold since then. Lindsey Vonn’s bronze in Vancouver was the only medal since.
Julia Mancuso’s silver in Vancouver was the first medal for the US in the combined event since a silver in 1948. The US has never won the event.
