Mikaela's coach as a young teen, the headmaster and head J3 coach at the time at Burke, is Kirk Dwyer. Kirk is perhaps the biggest proponent of rest and "periodization" that I know. He was talking about it long before any other coaches or PD's that I knew. Until Mikaela was skiing NorAms, and a year later in the WC at 16, she raced very infrequently. Trained, free skied with a purpose, drilled, and rested. There was no bigger example that when she won her J3 Junior Olympic SL, by something like 12 seconds. People knew she was a favorite, but hadn’t seen all that much of her. They were at Sunday River. Kirk explained that there was no point in her racing much, or overtraining. Guess it worked.
Rest as
@Swede says is SUPER important. Mikaela has always rested, frankly until last season when, IMO, the push to ski "five events" was too much. She was on fumes, sick, and exhausted from the OWG through the end of the season, and perhaps lucky to have not been injured. I view rest as more than sleep and napping.
I agree that her incredible technique and tactics do enable her to be rock solid. In fact the harder the set and surface the more solid she looks. And she does not need to take risks.
I know of a head coach at a very elite program in the USA who seems to be on a fairly big ego trip and self promotion tour. He has a number of FIS athletes under his wing, exceptional athletes
that he did not develop but is trying to take a lot of credit for. It is very, very clear. In the meantime, he has pushed them this season to travel, race, train and repeat. From what I have heard they have all "hit the wall" and are now dealing with sickness, some injury, surgery.......and NONE are skiing as well as they were last season or at the start of this season. That is not good. He is somebody who I believe wants to be "noticed", and then soon with the USST. Ugh. In the meantime the kids could suffer. He’s not alone in pushing kids.
Again, with respect to Hirscher and Shiffrin, I agree with
@Primoz. Her exhaustion last late season withstanding, MS is probably the most fit female on the WC. You see it, and have for years, in the bottom part of every race run. Between NOT having to have the gas pedal pinned, and her fitness, she always has some gas left in the tank. It's a huge advantage. I believe that her regimen regarding rest, recovery, food and sleep helps. She's not alone in that regard. I think that her basic skiing, which is SO incredibly solid, and executed so well also minimizes her getting thrown around, getting into the back seat, stuck in a "wheelie", etc. She is always in control, and other than her one knee strain a few years ago, has been remarkably healthy. Other "girls" blow ACL's and have lower leg injuries with frequency and they are just not close to her in terms of....everything. M doesn’t straddle, hook tips, etc. I bet she rarely even feels aches and strains.
Hirscher? In this country{USA} most race fans have NO info about him, other than the fact that he wins, and skis on Atomic {sort of}. They do not know of his athleticism, his discipline, and his incredible strength. He is build like a little bull, strong as an ox. He was talked about as being the next great thing when he was 16-17, and then he began to add more and more muscle mass. He skis with what LOOKS like the gas pedal pinned to the floor, but it's not. He knows exactly how to manage each run tactically, be it the first run, or the second {depending on how the first one went}. Part of the reason that he has win seven Overall globes in a row, and stayed healthy is because of his physical strength and athleticism. No question. He also takes care of himself.
And then he IS the technically best in the game, on top of that all. Explains his results. Nobody else is close.
So those two are in class of their own. For a bunch of combined reasons. I also suspect that being RedBull athletes and having all of their resources has to help.
I have my own opinions about the USST, conditioning, injuries. There sure are many of them. A lot among younger athletes. And, of course those who have had chronic injuries....often for an entire career. I don’t think it’s a LACK of conditioning, or too much time on snow. Not not enough time off snow. And rest.
Some of this is just bad, bad luck. Bad timing. Some is congenital. Like Mancuso’s hips. Some may be pushing to come back too soon and too hard...LV in recent years. Ligety’s back, Resi’s knees. I don’t know. There are a ton on injuries on the WC. Look at the women’s field. The best male speed skier on tour is retiring as his body is just broken.
Brutal sport. MS and MH are clearly very special outliers, IMO.
) with few racers and servicemen few days ago in Garmisch exactly about this. When you have whole team being constantly injured (USA or Canada for example) you are doing something wrong. Sure things can go horribly wrong in moment, but when there's most of team out, and it goes on pretty much every season, you should start asking what are you doing wrong. Nowadays, especially with 13 out of top 30 being out for season in men DH, there's trend to make DH races easier, slower and less challenging, but as far as I'm concerned, it's stupid way to go. There's no rule, you can't go different then straight line in DH. If you are not in shape for that, you either pick different (slower/easier) line, or you train more. It's same as trying to go with 350km/h without braking into corner in Formula1 and then complain tracks should be easier so you don't need to break.
