Paris (AFP) – Mikaela Shiffrin, who injured herself in a heavy fall during the Killington giant slalom at the end of November, hinted in an interview published on Wednesday that she may not race again this season. The 29-year-old American has been sidelined since suffering a punctured abdomen as she chased her 100th World Cup victory in the giant slalom at Killington, Vermont on November 30. She hit one gate and tumbled through another before sliding into the catch fencing and was taken from the hill on a sled and subsequently to hospital.
“I think if all things had gone perfectly and all the drainage just came out, we were pretty sure the season would be possible,” Shiffrin told Ski Racing. “It just depends on how I improve over the next weeks and months.” Initially, the injury was not thought to be long-term serious, but after undergoing surgery last Thursday “to clean out the wound,” it has revealed itself to be a deep puncture to her oblique muscle.
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“It is a deep puncture wound with quite a lot of severe muscle trauma,” said Shiffrin. “I was really lucky because it was probably like a millimetre from my colon. There’s not a lot of precedent for this injury in our sport. We can look at acute oblique tears in baseball, hockey and other sports, but ski racing is different.”
“When you think about the force of a GS turn or a slalom turn or a super-G turn, it’s hard to know what the muscle will withstand. We’re giving it a couple of weeks to see. I think we’ll get a clearer view each day of how it’s going to work.”
© 2024 AFP
