Page 4B WINTER GAMES East Oregonian Saturday, January 20, 2018 With Olympics coming, Shiffrin works because she worries “Slacking off never got anybody to win anything.” By PAT GRAHAM and HOWARD FENDRICH Associated Press Mikaela Shiffrin often fi nds herself fi xating on two thoughts that are completely detached from reality. “I feel every single day, fi rst of all, like I’ve never won a World Cup in my life,” the Alpine ski racing star told The Associated Press. “And I feel like I’m never going to win again.” Really? She is, don’t forget, an athlete who claimed the fi rst fi ve events she entered in 2018, a record, before a third-place showing in a downhill Friday at Cortina d’Am- pezzo, Italy. She has won eight of her past 10 races. This 22-year-old American, still presumably far closer to the start of her career than the end of it, regularly worries about no longer fi nishing fi rst? Well, yes. “Each one of these race results,” said Mike Day, her lead coach, “just gets stored away really quickly.” That, Shiffrin explains, is why she puts in all of the time and effort to stay on top. The extra ski runs — double sessions lasting four to fi ve hours on each of four consecutive days during a recent “off week” — and the video studying — 30 minutes to 1½ hours a day — and the fi tness training and everything else. “Her hard work is harder than anybody else out there,” Day said. And that, in turn, is why Shiffrin has established herself as the best Alpine ski racer there is at the moment, someone who is expected to be one of the faces of the Pyeong- chang Olympics, which open Feb. 9. “That’s why my team — my mom and my coaches and everyone around me — pushes me to train hard. They know that slacking off — Mikaela Shiffrin AP Photo/Alessandro Trovati United States’ Mikaela Shiffrin celebrates after coming third in an alpine ski, women’s World Cup downhill, in Cortina D’Ampezzo, Italy, on Friday. never got anybody to win anything. And if I stand still for a second, everybody else is moving forward, so they’re going to surpass me,” said Shiffrin, whose mother, Eileen, travels the circuit with her, serving as a coach and sounding board. “I don’t even feel like I deserve to have moments of celebration after races. Because it’s immediately time to get back to work, when you think about the big picture. I don’t win a World Cup and say, ‘OK, I’m good. I can die now.’ There’s other things I want to accomplish with my skiing.” She made that quite plain to the world at the Sochi Games four years ago. The day after becoming, at 18, the youngest slalom champion in Olympic history, Shiffrin announced at a news conference: “Right now, I’m dreaming of the next Olympics (and) winning fi ve gold medals, which sounds really crazy. I’m sorry I just admitted that to you all.” How crazy? The record for most Alpine golds at a single Winter Games is three, accomplished three times previously (Toni Sailer of Austria in 1956, Jean-Claude Killy of France in 1968, and Janica Kostelic of Croatia in 2002). But maybe this will be Shiffrin’s time. Even the schedule in South Korea is, as her coach Day put it, “extremely favorable for us.” In a change from 2014, the giant slalom and slalom — considered the more technical events, and her two best — open the women’s racing, with a three-day gap preceding the shift to the speed races, beginning with the super-G and, after another four-day hiatus, the downhill. Then comes the combined (one run each of slalom and downhill). Shiffrin called entering all fi ve “a very honest possibility.” Simply considering that at this stage of her career is a testament to what a quick study she is. Nowadays, Alpine competitors typically tend to focus either on technical or speed events, not everything. Little about Shiffrin is typical, though. It took her two World Cup starts to earn a top-three fi nish in a slalom, just three for her fi rst podium showing in a downhill. She won the World Cup overall title last season and is currently on pace for a second. She already equaled a record by earning her 41st World Cup race win before turning 23; Lindsey Vonn, by comparison, had seven before that age. “I mean, it’s fun to watch her, and for sure I want to beat her,” said Frida Hansdotter, who won silver or bronze for Sweden in the slalom at the past three world championships, behind champion Shiffrin each time, “but right now, she is in another league.” And to think: Day insists that Shiffrin “will, for sure, get better than she is right now.” That seems hard to fathom. Until one considers just how seriously Shiffrin takes her craft. She is constantly watching video of her own races and those of others — including six-time men’s World Cup overall champion Marcel Hirscher, who says he studies her, too — to see where there might be a tiny detail that can shave off a bit of time here or there. Part of that comes from within, to be sure. Part of it comes from the way her parents taught her about what it means to have fun. “‘Fun’ for us is a matter of doing things in a manner that actually make it where you’re good enough at it that it’s enjoyable,” said Shiffrin’s father, Jeff. “You can’t go out and just ‘have fun.’ Fun is something that comes from a skill level, whether it’s music or language or piano or public speaking or being a professional, being a writer. If you’re terrible at it, it’s not fun.” IOC creates pool of Russians eligible for Winter Olympics Associated Press LAUSANNE, Switzer- land — The International Olympic Committee said Friday it has created a pool of 389 Russians who are eligible to compete under a neutral fl ag at next month’s Winter Olympics amid the country’s doping scandal. An IOC panel whittled down an initial list of 500 to create what the IOC calls “a pool of clean athletes.” That could potentially make it possible for Russia to meet its target of fi elding around 200 athletes in Pyeongchang — slightly fewer than in Sochi in 2014, but more than in Vancouver in 2010. It wasn’t immediately clear why 111 other Russians were rejected by the IOC. The IOC didn’t list the athletes who were accepted or rejected, but said it hadn’t included any of the 46 the IOC previously banned for doping at the 2014 Olympics in Sochi. Valerie Fourneyron, the former French Sports Minister leading the invita- tion process, said the pool also left out any Russians who had been suspended in the past for doping offenses. “This means that a number of Russian athletes will not be on the list,” she said. “Our work was not about numbers, but to ensure that only clean athletes would be on the list.” That would appear to rule out potential Russian medal contenders like former NHL hockey player Anton Belov and world champion speedskater Pavel Kulizh- nikov, both of whom served bans in the past but have since resumed competing. “More than 80 per cent of the athletes in this pool did not compete at the Olympic Winter Games Sochi 2014,” the IOC said in a statement. “This shows that this is a new generation of Russian athletes.” The IOC will use the pool list to issue invitations to Russian athletes to compete in Pyeongchang, after checking their record of drug testing and retesting some samples they gave previously. EASTERN OREGON marketplace Place classified ads online at www.eastoregonmarketplace.com or call 1-800-962-2819 between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. Monday through Friday. After hours, leave a voicemail and we’ll confirm your ad the next business day. Email us at classifieds@ east oregonian.com or fax: 541-278-2680 East Oregonian Deadline is 3 p.m. the day before publication 211 S.E. Byers Ave. 333 E. Main St. We accept: Pendleton, OR 97801 Hermiston, OR 97838 See www.eastoregonmarketplace.com for classified ads from all over Eastern Oregon EAST OREGONIAN • HERMISTON HERALD • BLUE MOUNTAIN EAGLE • WALLOWA COUNTY CHIEFTAIN 104 Special Notices PLEASE CHECK YOUR AD ON THE FIRST DAY OF PUBLICATION. While we are happy to make any necessary corrections, we can not be responsible for errors appearing for mul- tiple days. Thank you! 184 Personals 502 Real Estate 504 Homes for Sale 504 Homes for Sale 504 Homes for Sale I am not responsible for any debts other than my own. 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