Mikaela Shiffrin and Paula Moltzan both posted top-5 slalom finishes Saturday in the final women’s event of the 2025 FIS Alpine World Ski Championships in Saalbach, Austria. 

Swiss skiers Camille Rast and Wendy Holdener went 1-2 and Katharina Liensberger of Austria took the bronze. Shiffrin was in third after the first run but had just the 12th-fastest second run and missed the podium by 0.05 seconds. It was the first time in seven world championship slalom starts that the Edwards skier has fallen out of the top-3 in her signature event.

“Today was something that I can learn from and to fully recover well for the rest of the season,” Shiffrin told assembled media. “It’s been eight weeks since I had surgery and six weeks since I was laying in bed with a drainage tube sticking out of me. So it’s like, perspective is important, but still we’re here and I want to do well.”

Moltzan posted the second-fastest second run of the day to earn her third ‘wooden medal’ of the championships. The Ski and Snowboard Club Vail alumna was also fourth in the team parallel and team combined but claimed a bronze in the giant slalom.

“To come across the line in the green light was a win for the day,” Moltzan told U.S. Ski and Snowboard’s Sierra Ryder. “I am very happy with fourth. It’s also my best slalom result of the season, so I feel good about it.”

The other American starters were Katie Hensien and A.J. Hurt. Hensien was a DNF in the first run and Hurt placed 19th. Eagle’s Reece Bell, an All-American at DU and a U16 national champion while at Ski and Snowboard Club Vail, moved up seven places in her second run to finish 20th for Great Britain.

Shiffrin originally planned to compete in both the slalom and the giant slalom at worlds, but opted out as she worked through lingering mental struggles following her injury at the Killington World Cup GS on Nov. 30. After a 60-day layoff, she finished 10th in a slalom in Courchevel on Jan. 30. Shiffrin said she knew after that it would take a lot to come close to the top women on Saturday. 

“I would say today was just right in line with my expectations,” she said. “It’s a little bit strange to be making a return midseason and especially (at) World Championships. It’s sort of strange to be balancing the feeling of ‘I just want to make progress’ and then the feeling of like, ‘where do medals fit into that?'”

Shiffrin won’t leave Austria empty handed. The 29-year-old paired up with Breezy Johnson to win gold in the team combined on Feb. 11, tying Christl Cranz as the most decorated world championship racer in history. Still, she said the process of “trying to figure out where she stands in the sport” throughout this comeback has been one of the “biggest learning experiences in her career.”

“I think it will continue through the end of the season,” Shiffrin stated. “But for now, this was a huge step forward.”