PARK CITY, UT (March 6) - Inspiring gold medal performances at the 2014 Olympic Winter Games earned alpine skiers Mikaela Shiffrin (Eagle-Vail, CO) and Ted Ligety (Park City, UT) U.S. Olympic Committee (USOC) Athlete of the Month honors for the month of February. Fellow U.S. Ski and Snowboard Association (USSA) athletes rounded out the remaining individual spots, with halfpipe skier Maddie Bowman (South Lake Tahoe, CA) and halfpipe snowboarder Kaitlyn Farrington (Sun Valley, ID) taking second and third in the female vote and slopestyle snowboarder Sage Kotsenburg (Park City, UT) and slopestyle skier Joss Christensen (Park City, UT) earning second and third place for the men. All of these athletes played key roles in the USSA’s record-matching performance in Sochi, earning a total of 17 medals, including eight gold.
HIGHLIGHTS
- Olympic gold medalists Ted Ligety and Mikaela Shiffrin were named USOC Athletes of the Month after their inspirational performances at the 2014 Olympic Winter Games in Sochi, Russia.
- At age 18, Shiffrin became the youngest Olympic gold medalist in women’s slalom history with her victory on Feb. 21. She finished 0.53 of a second ahead of the field to give her the first U.S. slalom victory since Phil Mahre in 1984 and the first women’s slalom victory since Barbara Cochran in 1972.
- Ligety became the first American male to win Olympic gold in giant slalom on Feb. 18. Leading the field by 0.93 of a second after his first run, he claimed the gold medal by 0.48 of a second. With the historic win, he became only the second U.S. alpine skier to win two Olympic gold medals after Andrea Mead Lawrence accomplished the feat in 1952.
- Rounding out the top three on the women’s side were halfpipe skier Maddie Bowman and halfpipe snowboarder Kaitlyn Farrington, both of whom claimed gold medals in their sports.
- On the men’s side, Sage Kotsenburg, the first-ever men’s gold medalist in slopestyle snowboarding, and Joss Christensen, who led a USA sweep of the slopestyle skiing podium, finished second and third in voting.
- Each National Governing Body may nominate one female, one male and one team per discipline for USOC Athlete of the Month. A voting panel selects the winners from the pool of nominees.
FEMALE
1. Mikaela Shiffrin, Alpine Skiing
2. Maddie Bowman, Halfpipe Skiing
3. Kaitlyn Farrington, Halfpipe Snowboarding
MALE
1. Ted Ligety, Alpine Skiing
2. Sage Kotsenburg, Slopestyle Snowboarding
3. Joss Christensen, Slopestyle Skiing
