ZAGREB, Croatia — Mikaela Shiffrin will have to wait at least a couple of more days to match Lindsey Vonn’s World Cup wins record.
A night slalom scheduled for Zagreb, Croatia, on Thursday was canceled due to warm temperatures and strong wind, organizers announced.
American standout Vonn set the women’s record of 82 before retiring in 2019. The overall best mark is 86, from Swedish great Ingemar Stenmark.
Shiffrin has 81 career wins, one fewer than Vonn’s women’s record.
Shiffrin, who has won five straight races across multiple disciplines, can match and break the record in two giant slaloms scheduled for Kranjska Gora, Slovenia, on Saturday and Sunday.
Shiffrin won the first of two scheduled slaloms in Zagreb on Wednesday. Using purely artificial snow at the low-altitude venue, organizers created a strip of white down an otherwise brown hill.
Shiffrin said the cancellation was “not the craziest surprise in the world, considering how little snow there was.
“But the fact that they pulled it off yesterday made me feel like it was definitely going to be pulled off today, so I’m shocked,” she added. “But I don’t know why I’m shocked, because it’s not that surprising.”
The International Ski Federation did not immediately announce if the Zagreb race would be made up at another resort.
Earlier this week, Shiffrin won the first women’s World Cup race of 2023, placing her within one win of matching Vonn.
“I’m happy, I’m incredibly happy. I mean, I had so much fun skiing today and it was really my best skiing both runs today,” said Shiffrin, who beat runner-up Petra Vlhová by 0.76 seconds.
The former overall champion of Slovakia had won the race on the outskirts of the Croatian capital the past three seasons.
The rest of the field finished more than 1.20 behind the American’s winning time.