'I could open a reindeer farm': The GOAT of ski racing, Mikaela Shiffrin, can now fill Santa's sleigh

In a town where reindeers outnumber people, the greatest skier of all time, Mikaela Shiffrin has picked up her 102nd World Cup victory.

She was awarded her ninth reindeer for her win.

Levi, located in the Finnish Lapland only 170km north of the Arctic Circle, hosts the opening slalom event for the 2025-2026 season for the FIS World Cup.

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Nine of Shiffrin's 102 victories have come in the traditional season-opening slalom event, where the winner is famously given a reindeer as their trophy, by Santa Claus no less.

Shiffrin has named each of her reindeer, so far the herd has been christened: Rudolph, Sven, Mr. Gru, Ingemar (named after GOAT ski racer in terms of World Cup wins, Sweden's Ingemar Stenmark), Sunny, Lorax, Grogu and Rori.

Her newest addition to the herd is called Winkie, named after her mother's childhood nickname.

Each of the living and breathing trophies live a happy life at Ounaskievari Reindeer Farm on the outskirts of the 900-person town Sirkka, where they frolic in the winter paddocks and roam in the Arctic wilderness.

The American star built a commanding lead on the slopes, more than a second quicker than her nearest competitor in both her runs and won by 1.66 seconds over second-placed Albanian teenager Lara Colturi.

"It's for sure a good feeling. It was so nice to race today. I felt really strong on both runs," Shiffrin said after the event.

"I was just feeling like, 'Oh, don't mess it up, like it would be embarrassing, kind of.' But then, in the end, if you are pushing as hard as you can, you can't mess it up.

"And yes, I could open a reindeer farm."

Who is Mikaela Shiffrin?

Shiffrin is the winningest skier in history with a record-breaking 102 career World Cup victories, one of America's crowning glories of their skiing athletes.

She is so far ahead of the field that the closest to her mark was Stenmark (who one of Shiffrin's reindeer is named after) with 86 victories and Lindsey Vonn with 82 World Cup wins.

She is a three-time Olympian with two gold medals and a silver. On the FIS Alpine Ski World Cup stage, she has won the Crystal Globe, skiing's most esteemed achievement, an overall five times.

She is the only athlete to win in each of the World Cup's six disciplines - slalom (65), giant slalom (22), super-G (5), downhill (4), combined (1) and parallel (5).

After an incredible 2019 season where she stood on the top step of the podium 17 times, she was lifted in the echelon to join some of America's best athletes such as Simone Biles and Vonn.

She was flagbearer for the 224-strong USA team sent to the 2022 Beijing Games. But at those Games, Shiffrin found herself under the microscope after failing to bring home any medals after facing three DNF results in her five events.

Her best result of fifth in the combined downhill was a far cry from her dominant, winning ways.

In 2024, Shiffrin suffered an abdominal injury during a bad crash in Vermont.

She was en route to changing the sport forever and collecting her 100th victory but caught an edge and fell just above the finish line, resulting in a seven-centimetre puncture wound in her abdomen that tore into her external and internal oblique muscles.

Just two and a half months after the injury, she finally claimed the 100th victory of her career in Italy in February 2025 and is now back on the slopes with a vengeance to show her prowess before Milan-Cortina Games get under way in February.

At the 2026 Winter Olympic Games, the 30-year-old could become the first American across all skiing disciplines to win a third Olympic gold medal after her titles in 2014 (slalom) and 2018 (giant slalom).