Petra Vlhová (born June 13, 1995) is a Slovak alpine ski racer who competes in slalom and giant slalom. She won the World Cup overall title in 2021 and a gold medal in the slalom event at the 2022 Winter Olympics, becoming the first Slovak skier to do so.
Career
Vlhová was born in Liptovský Mikuláš. As a child, she trained at the Podbreziny ski center in her hometown. The ski center, which is 700 meters high with 550 meters of ski tracks, later stopped being used in the 2000s and early 2010s. In 2022, Vlhová helped restart the center and supported local youth training groups.[1]
She won a gold medal at the 2012 Winter Youth Olympics and represented Slovakia in the 2014 Winter Olympics.[2] Vlhová also won a gold medal in slalom at the Junior World Championships in 2014 in Jasná, Slovakia.[3]
World Cup
She started competing in the World Cup at 17 years old in December 2012. Her first World Cup win came three years later in December 2015 when she won a slalom race in Åre, Sweden.[1] On January 17, 2016, she qualified for the second run in giant slalom for the first time and finished 14th in Flachau.[1]
2019 season
Petra Vlhová in Stockholm, 2019
In December 2018, Vlhová won her first World Cup giant slalom race for Slovakia in Semmering, Austria. She was in fourth place after the first run but did very well in the second run to win. Before this, her best result in giant slalom was seventh place.[4] A few days later, she won a parallel slalom race in Oslo, making it her sixth career win and the most World Cup wins by a Slovak alpine skier, surpassing Veronika Velez-Zuzulová.[5]
In January 2019, after finishing second to Mikaela Shiffrin in the first five classic slaloms of the season, Vlhová won the slalom in Flachau. She set the fastest time in the second run and won the race, earning €70,000, the biggest prize of the season for women. This was her fifth classic slalom win, putting her ahead of Velez-Zuzulová in wins for this discipline.[6]
At the Alpine World Ski Championships in February 2019, Vlhová won three medals. She won Slovakia's first-ever individual medal, a silver in the combined event, just missing gold by three-hundredths of a second to Wendy Holdener.[7] She then won Slovakia's first gold medal in the giant slalom[8] and took bronze in the slalom.[9]
2020 season
Vlhová began the 2020 season with a 14th-place finish in giant slalom at Sölden. She got her first podium of the season by finishing second in Slalom at Killington. On December 15, 2019, she won a parallel slalom race in St. Moritz. In the last race of 2019, she finished second in Lienz, just behind Mikaela Shiffrin.
She started the new year strong with three wins in four races. First, she won the slalom in Zagreb on January 4. Ten days later, she won the slalom in Flachau. On January 18, she won her only giant slalom race of the season in Sestriere, sharing the win with Federica Brignone.
Later in the season, Vlhová started competing in speed events to try to win the overall World Cup title. She finished 6th in both the downhill and super-G races in Bansko and had two more top 10 finishes in Garmisch-Partenkirchen. Her last win of the season was in slalom at Kranjska Gora on February 16. She also achieved her best downhill finish with a 4th place in Crans Montana on February 21. In the season's final race, she finished 4th in a super-G in La Thuile, which was her best result in that event.
The season was cut short because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Vlhová finished 3rd overall in the World Cup standings and won her first small crystal globes for slalom and parallel events.
2021 season
Vlhová started the season strong, finishing 3rd in the opening giant slalom in Sölden. She then won three races in a row: two slaloms in Levi and a parallel giant slalom in Lech/Zürs. In December, she finished 3rd in the first giant slalom in Courchevel , France, but didn’t finish the second one. In Val d'Isère, she placed 26th and 33rd in two downhills, but then finished 6th in the super-G.
Vlhová won three more races during the season: a slalom in Zagreb, a giant slalom in her home country at Jasná, and a slalom in Åre. She also got her first podium in a speed event by finishing 2nd in the super-G in Garmisch-Partenkirchen on February 1.
Vlhová won her first overall World Cup title at the finals in Lenzerheide by finishing 6th in the slalom. She became the first Slovak skier to achieve this.
2022 season
Vlhová ended her 5-year partnership with her Italian coach Livio Magoni after the 2021 season.[10] She then hired Swiss coach Mauro Pini.[11]
Vlhová started the new season well, finishing 3rd in the opening giant slalom in Sölden. She then won two slaloms in a row in Levi. She went on to win three more slaloms in Lienz, Zagreb and Kranjska Gora. She secured the slalom crystal globe by finishing second in Schladming, with two slaloms still left in the season.
Vlhová became the first Slovak alpine skier to win an Olympic medal by winning gold in the slalom at the Beijing Olympics.[12] After the first run, she was in 8th place, 0.72 seconds behind Lena Dürr, but she had the fastest second run and won gold by 0.08 seconds ahead of world champion Katharina Liensberger.
After the Olympics, Vlhová tried to defend her overall World Cup title. She won the giant slalom in Åre, marking her sixth win of the season. However, she lost the chance to win the big crystal globe after the final super-G race in Courchevel/Méribel when Mikaela Shiffrin finished second and won the title. Vlhová ended the season with two more podiums in slalom and giant slalom.
2023 season
Vlhová slalom skiing in Andora
Vlhová finished the season in third place overall.[13]
2024 season
Vlhová started the season well, finishing 3rd in the first giant slalom in Sölden. She got her first win of the season in slalom in Levi, which was her 20th slalom win in her career.
1 Including both parallel slalom and parallel giant slalom. Two parallel events have been classified in the ski-db.com results as classic events (the City Event slalom on 30/01/18 and the City Event slalom on 01/01/19). They are shown here as parallel events.
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