Olympics 2018 results: Sweden’s Frida Hansdotter wins gold in women’s slalom

United States skier Mikaela Shiffrin came up short in her attempt to win back-to-back gold medals on Thursday night, competing in the women’s slalom in Pyeongchang. On her second run in slalom, considered her specialty, she finished with a total time of 1:39.03, good enough for fourth behind Sweden’s Frida Hansdotter, Switzerland’s Wendy Holdener, and Austria’s Katharina Gallhuber.

She won gold in the giant slalom on Wednesday night. In her first run on the slalom, she finished with a time of 49.37, which was good enough for fourth after the first group of skiers. Before her race, Shiffrin threw up as she entered the starting gate.

“It almost felt like a virus, less about nerves,” she told NBC’s Heather Cox. “We will see. I’m not super far off. It’s nice to have that first round out of the way.” She napped before her second run though.

In an interview with The Washington Post, Shiffrin revealed she had been throwing up before races last year:

“I get so nervous; I was throwing up last year,” Shiffrin said. “It’s like, the races I’m supposed to win, I worry about what happens if I don’t. Who am I letting down? My family? The media? What’s the media going to say if I don’t win? I was listening, and I had never really listened to those things before.”

She slipped up a couple of times in her second run, causing her to lose some precious time. But still, this is pretty unexpected for Shiffrin to miss the podium completely. Since Sochi in 2014, in 34 starts, this marks just the fourth time she’s been off the podium.

However, she still has a chance to medal in both the women’s downhill and women’s combined next week. She announced after her gold medal win on giant slalom that she will not compete in Saturday’s super-G, which would cause her to have to ski three days in a row.

Shiffrin’s slalom obviously didn’t go like she wanted. We’ll see how she does in her events next week.