Feeling 22, and everything is so all right

The American racer Mikaela Shiffrin on Friday clinched enough points to win the fancy crystal globe that goes to the alpine World Cup tour’s best overall female skier.

She becomes just the third American to win the season title. Tamara McKinney won it in 1983. Lindsey Vonn has won four big globes, as they like to call it on the tour, most recently in 2012. Now comes Mikaela Shiffrin, who just this past Monday turned 22.

Taylor Swift could not have put it any better. Everything will be so all right.

This is the stuff of compelling cross-over stardom.

Mikaela Shiffrin is already an Olympic champion, the heavy favorite to win again at the 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea in not just one but perhaps three events — slalom, giant slalom and combined — and already so much more, the rare athlete who not only has a calm and a presence about her but, at 22, understands who she is, what she is doing and why.

It’s elemental.

Mikaela Shiffrin is who she is because she loves it, and passionately.

She loves every bit of it. She can take that passion and distill it into a killer work ethic and uncompromising want-to.

That, ladies and gentlemen, is how you forge the sort of great champion who, come Winter Games-time, makes for must-see TV.

Unlike the schedule at most Winter Olympics, at Sochi in 2014, for instance, when the so-called technical events ran near the back end of the 17 days, in Pyeongchang next February, guess what goes off on Day 2? Women’s giant slalom. Day 4? Women’s slalom.

Why? This missive from the Department of the Obvious: Mikaela Shiffrin.

Here is the thing that separates someone like Shiffrin from the rest of almost everyone else on skis.

For her, the racing is the fun part. For real. In the start gate, the mission is not just to see if she can be good but to see how good she can be.

Nervous? Like, why?

Why be nervous, why have a thought bubble full of anxious reminders cluttering your mind, when you have done everything you can possibly do to put yourself in the best position you can be?

For Mikaela Shiffrin, there are no shortcuts. She loves the training, the hours upon hours in the gym, the repetitions in the weight room and on the icy snow, the attention to detail, all the stuff that doesn’t get reflected in the photo snaps, what our 24/7 what-now culture demands, the pics that flash across the globe in milliseconds of a winning smile and a fancy crystal globe.

“I am always at my best,” she said, calmly, evenly, “when I get good preparation and I feel strong.”

That simple, that elemental, and Mikaela Shiffrin’s 2017 overall win marks an intriguing moment if, like most Americans, you are just checking in on what’s what in alpine skiing.

Alpine racing is, generally speaking, divided into two kinds — the technical events and the speed races.

When most casual fans think alpine, they think speed, something like Robert Redford in “Downhill Racer,” which goes all the way back to 1969. (Warren Miller's love sonnets on film to the sport do not count for the casual fan.)

Making this easy:

The speed events are the downhill and the super-G.

Downhill: spitballing it here, you see how fast you can get down the mountain. There are gates, but whatever— the main thing is the speed, like 80 miles per hour, which is a lot on a freeway in a car made significantly of metal and other durable parts, much less on skis chattering down a river of ice. A world-class course runs to two minutes. Try to imagine it: ice (it's ice, not fluffy snow), 80 mph, two minutes, skis, yikes.

Super-G, same general idea but some widely set gates and the course is set lower down the mountain, meaning it's shorter.

The tech events, on the other hand, are the twisty, turning ones, the ones with all the gates close together.

Making this easy, again:

Per someone clever, those tech events, the giant slalom and slalom, will be coming to your living room early in the 2018 Olympic run.

A fifth alpine event, the combined, is just what it sounds like, one speed event and one tech, say a super-G and a slalom. You add the times of those two races together, lowest total wins.

On the men’s side, an Austrian racer, Marcel Hirscher, has won the World Cup overall title six seasons running — 2012 through 2017.

Hirscher is a tech specialist, the king of slalom and in the 2015 and 2017 seasons, giant slalom, too.

Compare that to the American standout Bode Miller, a five-event skier who won the overall title in 2005 and 2008.

Shiffrin is a tech specialist, too. She is the Sochi 2014 slalom gold medalist. She is the World Cup slalom winner for the 2013, 2014, 2015 and 2017 seasons. (She spent two months away from racing during the 2016 season after a fall.)

Compare that to Vonn, the German Maria Höfl-Riesch (2011 overall winner), the Slovenian Tina Maze (Sochi 2014 downhill and giant slalom champ, showing her versatility, and 2013 World Cup overall winner with an otherworldly 2,414 points, breaking the legendary Austrian hammer Hermann Maier’s record of 2,000, set in 2000).

All three of these women: four- or five-event racers.

Would Shiffrin this season have been competing in more speed events if the Swiss racer Lara Gut, the 2016 overall champ, had not, in a Feb. 10 warm-up at the world championships, torn an ACL?

If, similarly, the Austrian Anna Veith was not coming back from injury? Before she got married, she was Anna Fenninger — the name by which she won Olympic gold in 2014 in the super-G and, moreover, won the big globe in 2015 and 2014.

Heading into the weekend’s racing in Aspen, Shiffrin stood at 1,523 points. No matter what happens, she can’t come within a canyon of Maze’s 2,414. Does that matter, even a little? Gut had 1,522 in winning last season. Shiffrin already is better. Again, does that matter, even remotely?

Questions without answers and, anyway, it’s not as if Shiffrin can’t ski speed.

Shiffrin did, after all, win a combined this season, in late February, in Crans-Montana, Switzerland, and it’s for sure the case that as she goes and grows, all involved expect Shiffrin will do more speed.

A comparison: when Michael Phelps was a much younger swimmer, his coach, Bob Bowman, would allow him only to swim distance. As he grew into his ability, Bowman saw to it that Phelps broadened his repertoire.

Same general idea with Shiffrin.

The thing is, she and her team have a plan, and what Shiffrin and her team do, and exceedingly well, is develop and execute that plan.

As Julia Mancuso, the American skier who is herself a four-time Olympic medalist, including a gold from the Torino 2006 Games, said, “If it isn’t broke, why fix it? That’s their mindset.”

Mancuso added, “It takes a lot of strength to not deviate from that plan as well.”

Ski racing is full of numbers — so many it can become numbing — but just consider a handful.

Before this weekend’s races, Shiffrin had stood in the start gate 103 times. She had produced 31 wins and 43 podiums.

As Patrick Riml, the U.S. Ski Team’s alpine director, put it, “Her strike rate is unbelievable.”

It is often said that hitting a major-league curve ball is the hardest thing to do in sports. Those who say that have never stood in the start gate of a World Cup course and looked at the gates and the ice. Shiffrin’s win rate would make her, in baseball terms, an All-Star, a .300 hitter. Her podium rate puts her in Rogers Hornsby or Ted Williams category.

Long-range: Vonn has 77 World Cup victories. Sweden’s Ingemar Stenmark has the most, 86.

“Kudos to [parents] Jeff and Eileen for teaching Mikaela what it takes,” Riml said.

“Look,” he said, “everyone who skis the World Cup has talent. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be there.

“Who wants it? Who wants it bad enough? Who wants it bad enough on race day?

“You can see it,” he said, “from the start gate,” and indeed you can.

Mikaela Shiffrin wants it. And she is feeling every bit of 22.

Ted Ligety's 'awesome' GS gold

KRASNAYA POLYANA, Russia — A couple years ago, they made a rules change in the giant slalom. Citing the interest of athlete safety, they made the skiers change to longer, straighter skis. Those skis are way harder to turn. Ted Ligety, the American who had ruled the giant slalom, complained bitterly.

And then he figured out a way to ski on those new skis, lower and longer in the turns, that further separated himself from everyone else in the world. He could now win races by astonishing margins.

At Wednesday’s men’s super-G at Rosa Khutor, Ted Ligety put on a clinic to win the first American alpine skiing gold of these Olympics. Indeed, he won big. It was one of the great moments of the 2014 Games. Here, for the entire world to bear witness, was sheer excellence — the excellence the sport demands as well as the excellence the man demands of himself.

It was, in a word, awesome.

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Tina Maze's GS poetry slam

KRASNAYA POLYANA, Russia — Slovenia’s Tina Maze calls slalom her favorite discipline, which perhaps is a surprise given that it is, of the five alpine ski events, her weakest. It is giant slalom that brings out her soulful side. “GS,” she says, “is like poetry for me.”

In that spirit, after a wild and wet day Tuesday at Rosa Khutor that saw Maze fight through snow, rain, sleet and fog to win her second gold medal of the 2014 Winter Games and indisputably re-establish that she is, no question, the No. 1 female skier on Planet Earth, here is a haiku to commemorate not just the moment but the ski poetry Maze slammed down in winning the GS:

Tina Maze wins

One more Sochi gold medal

What now, Lindsey Vonn?

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Bode: skiing for a higher purpose

KRASNAYA POLYANA, Russia — It has been manifest since he strapped his boots into into skis here at the Rosa Khutor complex that Bode Miller was racing with a higher sense of purpose at these Olympic Games. He has wanted it bad, perhaps too badly, sought in the expression of sport and art that has always been his calling, in the rush of a minute or maybe two in the joinder of man and mountain, to find that moment of clarity and, indeed, of transcendence.

At the bottom of the hill Sunday, when the big scoreboard said he was on his way to winning an Olympic medal for the sixth time in his storied career, Bode Miller cried. His wife, Morgan, cried. They hugged each other. Holding an American flag, she helped him regain his composure amid television interviews. Later, on the podium, the flag draped over his right shoulder, before congratulating the others — because Bode Miller has always believed in sportsmanship — he appeared to be alone with his thoughts.

And then it all became clear.

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Austria's Big Red Machine is back

KRASNAYA POLYANA, Russia — After Austrian racers had on Saturday dominated yet another  edition of the women’s Olympic super-G, the Canadian skier Canadian Marie-Michele Gagnon was asked the obvious: how can this be? And she laughed. The fourth gold medal — out of eight — in Olympic super-G history? The third Olympic super-G gold in a row?

On a day when 18 of the 49 best racers in the world didn’t even finish, the highest drop-out rate in women’s super-G Olympic history, an attrition rate of 36.7 percent, the Austrians went 1-3, Anna Fenninger taking gold, Nicole Hosp bronze. Only a late surge into second place by Germany’s Maria Hoefl-Riesch kept it from being 1-2.

Gagnon laughed because the answer, too, was obvious: “Why are Canadians good at hockey?

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Downhill tie: 'crazy and cool'

KRASNAYA POLYANA, Russia — The Olympic women’s downhill course here at Rosa Khutor measures out at 2713 meters, or precisely 8900 feet. That’s just shy of a mile and three quarters. On Wednesday, the best racers would hit speeds of more than 60 miles per hour.

On the one hand, it’s all a math problem. You win by getting down the mountain faster than anyone else. On the other, it’s an exercise in fear versus logic. You strap on boots, fix your feet on sticks and throw yourself down a river of ice, hope your mountain-men technicians have figured out the right wax and try to slice down that ice all in one piece, the orange safety nets flashing by, the rest of you wrapped in nothing but lycra, your head in a bobble of plastic. See how that feels.

The alpine ski show makes for a fantastic traveling camp that simultaneously includes elements of the backwoods and high-tech, a mash-up of the best and not-so of American and European cultures with the ever-present scent of danger, a reminder of the fragility of the human condition rooted in the need to test what the soul is capable of against the power of the mountain. That’s why it always verges on the edge, literally and figuratively: can you believe this?  On Wednesday, it tipped over.

In a first in Olympic alpine ski history, the downhill ended in a tie.

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Ligety wins first-ever super-G

When the Austrians throw a ski party, make no mistake. It's great. They're super-glad to welcome friends and visitors. But they expect, indeed demand, victory. Alpine racing in Austria is like the NFL in the United States. It's what they do. It doesn't get any bigger. It's why, at the opening ceremony of the world championships a couple days ago in Schladming, the Herminator -- famed racer Hermann Maier -- shared the stage with the Terminator, Arnold Schwarzenneger, the Austrian-born actor and former California governor.

After two races at the worlds, the Austrians are oh-for-six while the U.S Ski Team, capped by Ted Ligety's stunning win Wednesday in the super-G, already has two medals. Julia Mancuso took third Tuesday in the women's super-G.

There are many races yet to go at these championships. But even with the season-ending injury that Lindsey Vonn suffered Tuesday, even with Bode Miller taking a little time off, let there be no doubt:

The U.S. team is deep and capable, and building with purpose toward the Sochi 2014 Games, which start in exactly one year.

Ligety's winning time, in front of a crowd of 24,000 people: 1:23.96. France's Gauthier De Tessieres -- a late starter, replacing an injured teammate -- took a surprise second, 20-hundredths of a second back. Norway's Aksel Lund Svindal, winner of three of four World Cup super-Gs this season, was third, another two-hundredths back.

American Thomas Biesemeyer finished 13th; Ryan Cochran-Siegle, after starting 25th, finished 15th.

Another American, Andrew Weibrecht, bronze medalist in the super-G at the Vancouver 2010 Olympics, was challenging for a medal but missed a gate near the end.

"Weibrecht's skiing today was awesome -- fantastic skiing," U.S. head coach Sasha Rearick said afterward. "Unfortunately, he got a little bit unlucky on one turn there at the bottom.

"Biesemeyer did a great job coming back from injury to get into the points [meaning the World Cup start list] and RCS, starting in the back -- where people had no chance -- he skied great, excellent execution. For a 21-year-old kid to do that, here at the world champs, is really, really fun to see. Awesome momentum-building."

As for Ligety: the victory marked his first super-G win, ever.

At any race level.

This from a skier who is an Olympic gold-medalist in the combined (2006), world champion in the giant slalom (2011) and three-time World Cup season GS title winner.

This season, Ligety had continued his giant slalom dominance -- he leads the GS points race by 125, over Austria's Marcel Hirscher -- but had stepped up his game in other disciplines, super-G in particular, with a sixth at Kitzbühel and two fourth-place finishes.

He had written on his blog last week about the course at Schladming, "I'm one of the better guys in super-G, and that super-G hill in Schladming is steep and technical, giving me a very good chance of medaling."

Just to show you how difficult the alpine game can be, however, it's not just that the course is steep and technical, or that the light can be flat, which it was Wednesday -- there are variables the real pros, like Ligety, have to learn to master.

The course Wednesday featured 42 gates. Who set the course? Norway coach Tron Moger. He also fixed the gates when Svindal won the super-G in Val Gardena, Italy, in December.

Svindal later said, as Associated Press reported, "I took a lot of risks and had a small mistake at the end. The conditions were OK but not ideal. With this [low] light, you don't see the bumps. I am satisfied. Ted did just great."

What Ligety did seems risky but actually makes total sense. He used his giant slalom skills to shave time at the bottom, where it was steeper. That's where he won the race.

"The bottom I knew I could make up time -- it suited my technique," Ligety said. "I took a lot of risk. It was a good day."

Twelve years ago, the Austrians thought they had the super-G wired at the 2001 world championships in their backyard, in St. Anton. American Daron Rahlves came in and won it.

"Ted has been skiing great. All season he has been charging -- clean skiing and with the confidence to take it down the hill at super-G speeds," Rearick said, adding a moment later, "We had a great training camp leading into here. He came in skiing with confidence and executed great skiing. When you put those things together -- why not?"

Lindsey Vonn's risk-it-all strategy: overall, rewarding

Last season, after making an incredible late charge, Lindsey Vonn lost out at a chance at her fourth straight overall World Cup title by a measly three points, in part because of bad weather on the very last day. She said at the time she was "devastated." This season, Lindsey has skied with unmistakable passion, and that emotion has been further channeled by everything going on behind the scenes in her personal life, including the split early in the season from her husband, Thomas, and a reconciliation with her father, Alan Kildow.

When she skis, Lindsey has said, she is "very clear-minded," on her game like never before -- bluntly, like very few athletes, American or otherwise, in any sport, have been in any season.

Racing Friday in Are, Sweden, Lindsey won a World Cup giant slalom.

It was her 11th victory of the season, and 52nd of her career. It locked up the 2012 overall World Cup title -- obviously, her fourth in five years.

"I don't know what to say. I just wanted to have two really aggressive runs today," Lindsey said at the bottom of the hill, her U.S. teammates cheering.

"I have nothing to lose. I'm just having fun. My sister is here," younger sister Laura. "My teammates are so cool, cheering me on in the finish."

She added, "I am just really excited."

Some facts and figures, and keep in mind two things. These numbers and statistics can only suggest how dominant Lindsey has been. And the season is not yet over:

Lindsey's four World Cup overall titles are the most by an American skier. Phil Mahre had three.

The most-ever? Austria's Annemarie Moser-Pröll, with six, won in the 1970s. Lindsey, with those four, is now alone in second place. Croatia's Janica Kostelic, Switzerland's Vreni Schneider and Austria's Petra Kronberger had three apiece.

The 52 career victories leave her only 10 behind Moser-Pröll. Lindsey got to 50, in early February, faster than any female racer in history. Lindsey's first win came on Dec. 3, 2004, a downhill in Lake Louise, Canada.

The 11 victories this season match the U.S. record Lindsey set two seasons ago.

For the season, Lindsey now has 1,808 World Cup points. That's an American record.

Lindsey had 1,788 points when she won the 2009 overall.

In second place in the 2012 overall standings: Tina Maze of Slovenia, with 1,254 points. That's a 554-point lead. Again, and for emphasis: Lindsey lost last year, to her friend Maria Riesch of Germany, by three.

There are five races left on the World Cup calendar.

No female racer has reached 2,000. In 2006, Kostelic reached 1,970 points. In 1997, Sweden's Pernilla Wiberg got to 1,960.

On the men's side, Austria's Hermann Maier reached exactly 2,000 points in -- there was a nice symmetry here -- in 2000.

You bet Lindsey has noticed she is within striking distance of 2,000.

In prior seasons, she said in a conference call later Friday with American reporters, 2k had never seemed possible. "Trying to beat the 2,000-point barrier is something extremely significant. This opportunity may never happen in my career again," she said, adding a moment later, "I'm going to fight in every race until the end."

Indeed, she said, that's what this entire season has been about -- seizing focus, opportunity and momentum and not letting go.

She said she was "disappointed" to have lost last year by three, wanted "to come out this season starting strong and keep the momentum going," and "then the problems in my personal life … have made me a little more focused."

Last year, she said, taught her "to seize every opportunity, to put everything on the line," in every race.

Moreover, skiing has been a source of stability and solace. Racing, and in particular this season, has been a complete release from everything else.

She said, "I mean, I have had a lot of difficult times in my life, just with injuries and family issues," a reference to the arc of her entire career. "But, you know, skiing is always the constant in my life and I can always rely on it."

The 2012 overall title is the 15th of Lindsey's career and the third of this season; she had previously clinched the downhill and super-combined.

The giant slalom that Lindsey won Friday? That was the second giant slalom victory of her career, both this season, testament to the men's skis she switched to this year and the ferocious workouts she did last summer after coming up those three points shy last March.

Men's skis are longer and more rigid. To control them, Lindsey had to be in distinctly better shape. The advantage of using those longer, stiffer skis is that they enable Lindsey to ski a straighter line. A straighter line means she can, in essence, go faster. Thus: new success this season in the giant slalom.

The first giant slalom victory kick-started the season -- in the very first race, last October, in Soelden, Austria.

On Friday, in flat light and in bumpy, slushy conditions, Lindsey held a lead of seven-hundredths of a second after the first run. That marked the first time in her career Lindsey had ever held a first-run lead in giant slalom.

"I didn't want to let this opportunity pass me by," she said later. "I knew I could win but I still wanted to risk everything. I knew I had to risk everything."

So she really turned it on, leading at every interval to extend her winning margin to 48-hundredths of a second.

Federica Brignone of Italy, the giant slalom world championships silver medalist, came in second; Viktoria Rebensburg of Germany, who won both GS races last weekend in Ofterschwang, finished third, 1.05 seconds back.

Two other Americans finished in the top-15: 28th birthday girl Julia Mancuso, eighth, Resi Stiegler, continuing her late-season surge, 13th.

"I am thrilled," Lindsey said, excited and breathing hard, in the finish area.

Asked if she was going to be taking time off to celebrate, she said, jokingly, "I wish."

No one wishes. Of course the calendar will turn soon enough to spring. And even all great things have to come to an end.

But there are still five races to go.

A historic 50th for Lindsey Vonn

You wonder whether Lindsey Vonn is so good this season that the point has come whether she has simply imposed her will on everything and everyone around her. She did it again Saturday, winning the historic 50th World Cup victory of her career in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany, even though temperatures in the Bavarian Alps were crazy cold and she had to survive a near-crash about halfway down.

Lindsey's winning time, in temperatures of -13 Fahrenheit, so cold that racers had to tape their faces to avoid frostbite, was 1:44.86. She trailed through the early intervals. Yet by the finish she was, again, first, and by almost half a second.

Nadja Kamer of Switzerland finished second, 41-hundredths of a second back. Tina Weirather of Liechtenstein crossed third, 79-hundredths back, for her third World Cup podium finish, all this season.

Last year's overall World Cup winner and a Garmisch local, Maria Höfl-Riesch, Lindsey's good friend and rival, finished fourth, in 1:45.85, 99-hundredths back.

At 27, Lindsey is the youngest woman to reach 50 World Cup victories. Only Annemarie Moser-Pröll of Austria, with 62, and Switzerland's Vreni Scheider, with 55, have more.

Of the three, Lindsey got to 50 the fastest, with just seven years between her first World Cup win and her 50th. It took Moser-Pröll eight years.

Men's racers with 50 or more victories: Ingemar Stenmark (86), Hermann Maier (54), Alberto Tomba (50).

"I mean, when I was a kid I dreamed of winning the Olympic gold medal and I wanted to ski like people like Alberto Tomba did," Lindsey said Saturday night from Garmisch on a conference call with a few American reporters. "But I never dreamed I would have reached the successes they reached in their careers.

"I still have a lot of years of racing in me. I have been at a loss for words all day. It definitely is something I never expected. It takes a lot of hard work to get to this many wins and it is a huge milestone in my career."

The Garmisch downhill, 1.8 miles long, is called the Kandahar. It's a course that, by now in her career, Lindsey knows well -- but, intriguingly, one she had never won.

Last year, they held the world championships on this course, and despite battling the effects of a concussion, Lindsey finished second.

All week, anticipation ran high that Lindsey would get that 50th victory. She had come oh-so-close to 50 last weekend in St. Moritz, Switzerland, winning first a super-combined (48), then a downhill (49) and then, last Sunday, coming in second, behind Höfl-Riesch in another super-combined by a mere three-hundredths of a second.

In Garmisch, there's an American military base essentially at the bottom of the run. During the week, Lindsey and others on the U.S. team had visited with some of the U.S. troops -- so she and the other American racers, as they always do there, had a built-in red, white and blue rooting crew.

Three other Americans finished Saturday in the top 15: Stacey Cook ninth, Laurenne Ross 10th, Julia Mancuso 13th. The U.S. women's team leads the downhill Nations Cup standing race -- over Austria -- by 433 points. Austria leads the overall standings with 3555 points, the Americans second with 2428.

At the second split, Lindsey trailed by 62-hundredths. Then came a bump about halfway down the course that saw Lindsey lose the inside edge of a ski and slide onto a hip and almost out of the race. Almost.

She recovered, found a line and made up time.

The U.S. head coach, Alex Hoedlmoser, who had been standing by the side of the course about 20 meters away from the spot where Lindsey almost went down, said afterward that watching her slip "stopped my heart a little bit."

But, he said, she "pulled it off like nobody else would."

She said, "I definitely gave the coaches a little bit of a scare there."

She also said, "I felt like I was down on my hip and then right back up again," the kind of mistake she has made before and assuredly will make again. "I do make mistakes quite a few times in downhill and super-G. I just have to keep my composure and ski the line I expect at maybe a more aggressive pace -- I have to keep my composure and keep going."

The victory Saturday was Lindsey's ninth -- already -- on the 2011-12 tour. She has won four downhills.

Of her 50 World Cup victories, 25 have been downhills.

Lindsey now has 1350 points for the season, a whopping 482-point lead over Tina Maze of Slovenia. Höfl-Riesch stands third with 746.

Lindsey leads the downhill points tally as well, by 230.

The next event: a super-G, on Sunday, still in Garmisch. Lindsey leads the super-G standings this season, too.

This season, of course, has come amid considerable turmoil in Lindsey's personal life. She split from her husband, Thomas. Lindsey's sister, Laura, was on hand in Garmisch as was her father, Alan Kildow, and stepmom. She said she was glad to be able to share the historic moment with family.

Make no mistake. The time that Lindsey gets on the mountain is, in many ways, sanctuary. When she's up there in that start gate, it just her and her very considerable will, alone.

The best two minutes of her day are coming right up. She couldn't be happier.

"I'm really enjoying skiing," she said in that conference call. "I feel like no matter what going on in my personal life I can put my skis on and go out and have fun.

"Skiing has been honestly the best thing for me in my life at this point. It's hard to describe. Things in the personal front aren't any better than they were a few months ago. I feel very clear-minded when I'm skiing. I enjoy it … it's just a different state of mind."

Lindsey Vonn: halfway to 2k

It was a perfect day for alpine skiing Friday in St. Moritz, Switzerland, site of the 1928 Winter Olympics, blue skies and no wind, the kind that makes you think about possibilities. They held the first super-combined race this season on the women's tour, and Lindsey Vonn won, her 48th career World Cup victory.

Slovenia's Tina Maze finished second, 41-hundredths of a second back. Nicole Hosp of Austria finished third, 58-hundredths behind.

Lindsey leads the 2012 season overall World Cup standings by 302 points over Maze. A victory would make for Lindsey's fourth overall title in the past five seasons.

Beyond that is where the possibilities start getting truly tantalizing.

It's not even the end of January. Lindsey now has 1,070 World Cup points.

No female racer has ever reached 2,000 for the season.

In 2006, Croatia's Janica Kostelic got to 1,970. In 1997, Sweden's Pernilla Wiberg reached 1,960.

On the men's side, Austria's Hermann Maier -- the Herminator -- reached exactly 2,000 points in the 2000 season.

It's not unthinkable now that -- if she stays healthy and if the weather holds -- Lindsey could reach 2k.

It's abundantly clear that Lindsey is racing this season with unquenchable ambition and desire.

Part of that is from last year -- the way the 2011 season ended, when Lindsey came up three points shy of winning the overall World Cup title, denied in measure because of bad weather after making an incredible late charge. Her good friend and rival, Germany's Maria Riesch, won the 2011 overall title.

Riesch -- who got married over the summer and is now Hoefl-Riesch -- is winless this season.

Meanwhile, and Lindsey has made this perfectly plain time and again, she absolutely loves to ski; her passion for ski racing has carried her through the rough patches these months in her personal life with the announcement of the divorce from her husband, Thomas. The two minutes or so of each race are time when all that can be left behind. It's just her and her skis and the snow and the mountain, and nothing else matters.

There are two more races to go this weekend in St. Moritz -- a downhill on Saturday and then another super-combined on Sunday, a make-up race from Val d'Isere in December.

Traditionally, Lindsey has done very well indeed in St. Moritz. The victory there Friday made for the sixth podium finish there in her career.

The downhill is Lindsey's specialty; Nearly half, 23, of her career World Cup victories have come in the downhill and she is, of course, the 2010 Olympic downhill champion.

She is, moreover, the super-combined World Cup season event champion the past two seasons.

Intriguingly, Lindsey's slalom -- the second piece of the super-combined -- seems to be picking up. She finished seventh this past Sunday at the World Cup slalom stop at Kranjska Gora, Slovenia, and said Friday, after the super-combined in St. Moritz, "I am a lot more confident this year. My equipment is working really well. I feel just more sure of myself.

"A lot of times I don't have enough training in slalom. I lack confidence. You can see it in my body language when I'm skiing. Today I knew what I had to do. I knew I had to be smart, use good tactics on the pitches and let it go on the flats. I feel solid. I think it's getting better by day with my slalom results and definitely helping with my combined results as well."