ALTA BADIA, Italy (Dec. 22) - Four-time World Champion Ted Ligety (Park City, UT) was held to third Sunday in the Alta Badia giant slalom as Austrian Marcel Hirscher captured his second straight giant slalom win. Midway through the eight-event Audi FIS Alpine World Cup giant slalom season, Ligety and Hirscher have each won a pair of races, however Hirscher leads this discipline standings by 60 points after Ligety did not finish the giant slalom last weekend in Val d'Isere, France.

VAL D'ISERE, FRANCE (Dec. 21) - Leanne Smith (N. Conway, NH) survived a bumpy Val d'Isere downhill to lead the U.S. Ski Team with a tie for 14th on a track that bounced eight racers, including four Americans, off course. Lindsey Vonn (Vail, CO), in her first race in two weeks, was among the non finishers. Vonn was rattled in the midsection of the course, pulled out and skied to the finish. Stacey Cook (Mammoth Mountain, CA) was in the podium hunt when the washboard snow sent her sailing into the nets. Cook skied away without injury.

PARK CITY, UT (May 19) – Olympic and World Champion slalom winner Mikaela Shiffrin (Vail, CO) was honored by the U.S. Ski and Snowboard Association with the 2014 Beck International Award, the organization’s highest athlete honor. The USSA also recognized former USSA President and CEO Bill Marolt with the Julius Blegen Award, its highest honor, for vision and service that led the USSA to become Best in the World. Ski & Snowboard Club Vail was named Club of the Year and also walked away with top honors in four individual sports.

Mikaela Shiffrin began turning heads almost instantly when she finished top 15 of her first two NorAm Cup races. And ski fans (and coaches) went cross eyed when she landed a World Cup podium during her rookie season – at age 16. During her official World Cup "rookie" year, she took a slalom podium with third just after Christmas, giant slalom points in February and a trip to the elite top-25 World Cup Finals. She ended the season ranked 17th in the world in slalom – as a 17-year-old.

GARMISCH-PARTENKIRCHEN, Germany (Jan. 31, 2016) – Warm, wet weather and soft, unfavorable course conditions cancelled both the men and women’s Audi FIS Ski World Cup races Sunday.

At the women’s slalom in Maribor, Slovenia, start times were move back as crews worked on fine-tuning the course. However, after 24 racers completed the first run, including Resi Stiegler (Jackson, WY) finishing 13th, the race was cancelled due to unfavorable course conditions.

BORMIO, Italy (Dec. 29) - Bode Miller (Franconia, NH) attacked the washboard surface of the rugged Stelvio downhill in Bormio to finish fifth and overtake the Audi FIS Alpine World Cup downhill lead. Vancouver Olympic downhill gold medalist Didier Defago won the race with teammate Patrick Kueng in second for a historic Swiss 1-2 finish. Miller won the Audi Birds of Prey downhill earlier this month in Beaver Creek, CO and was ninth in the season-opening downhill in Lake Louise, Alberta.

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FLACHAU, Austria (Dec. 20) - Austrian Marlies Schild took the wire-to-wire win for the 30th Audi FIS Alpine World Cup slalom win of her career Tuesday as World Cup overall leader Lindsey Vonn (Vail, CO) finished eighth. Vonn will carry a 554-324 point lead in the overall standings over Schild into the Christmas break. Women's World Cup action returns Dec. 28-29 with a giant slalom and slalom in Lienz, Austria.

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