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- [00:03]
A
Hey, everybody. Welcome to this special Saturday edition of here's the scoop from NBC News. I'm Yasmin Vasugin. So tomorrow night, the cauldrons are gonna go dark in both Milan and Cortina as the 2026 Winter Olympics come to a close. And what a ride it has been. Earlier on in the week, alpine skier Michaela Shiffrin in Cortina blazed down the slalom course a full second and a half faster than her competition, making a comeback to secur third Olympic gold medal. It was quite a moment, to say the least. But what you didn't see was everything that led up to it. She has been through so much. We sat down with Michaela for a very candid conversation about mental health, about grief, and how she manages when she is an Olympian. This is my conversation with Michaela Shifrin. Hi, Mikayla.
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B
Hi. How are you doing?
- [01:04]
A
I'm good. How are you doing? I think is the. Is the question. We are so happy for you. Congratulations on your Olympic gold medal in slalom. It seemed like the most perfect run. I've watched it over and over again. You didn't make a single mistake, and. And not only did you win, I mean, you. You really won. The last couple of years have been tough for you, and I think that's why this is so incredible now, right? You lost your dad in 2020. You walked away from Beijing without a medal. You had this crazy injury in 2024 where you were essentially stabbed by the gate. These games also didn't start. These games didn't start. Start also the way that you wanted to in. In your performance in the combined with Breezy. But then you came back in the slalom, and as I mentioned, you came back in such a big way. How did you muster the mental strength to do that?
- [02:06]
B
Oh, my gosh. I think this Olympic experience has been so much about, like, simplification. It's probably the most challenging thing, if not, like, almost impossible to do, to truly focus on just the skiing in the moment and the. The rest of the time, you know, in the. In the quiet moments outside of skiing and when we're not on the hill training and, you know, the rest of the time around this Olympics, it's been full of wonderful moments, but definitely full of a sense of, I don't know, like, adrenaline and anticipation, and sometimes that is really, really hard to control. So, yeah, yeah, this. This experience has been so much about, like, relying on my team and communicating with. With all of them, with the coaches and staff and every, you know, my whole support system and really helping them. Help me to tell them all my concerns and fears and, you know, being afraid of what criticism might come if. If I. If I don't, you know, achieve the skiing that I want and this doesn't go the way, and these sort of external narratives start to take a hold and how I take it so personally, and, you know, to talk about these things and then to tell them, you know, you must remind me of my purpose here. My purpose is in the skiing between the start and the finish. All of this exists, and I'm aware of it. But in the end of the day, what I'm proud of is my capabilities on the snow. And what we're here to do is attack the race course, and that's it. We've been racing all season, and we showed up to the Olympics and we continued to train and, I don't know, learn. Learn from the moments in the very beginning of the Games when I was a little bit taken aback by some of the conditions and core setting and a few things from the team combined that really we turned into a learning experience and went out and showed up for the slalom race day, ready to do the skiing I was capable of doing. And the most amazing feeling was to have two runs of execution.
- [04:28]
A
I mean, the most incredible, perfect runs I literally have ever seen in slalom racing.
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B
Oh, thank you.
- [04:36]
A
I also love that you were kind of honest and transparent with your team in what you needed to get through, especially considering all the pressure that you had on you, not just as an Olympic racer, but just being Mikaela Shiffrin. Right. Like, knowing that you were going into this and everyone's watching you and going, oh, my God. Mikaela Shifrin has gotta perform because she didn't do it last time.
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B
Yeah.
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A
And she's gotta do it this time.
- [04:56]
B
Yeah. It's. It's super loaded. And I think, honestly, this is something before people were even starting to talk about it. You know, back in the summertime, I was starting to feel the. The tension from knowing that these. These are the storylines that get built up. And on the one hand, as an athlete, you appreciate it so much because it's. It's. What really breathes life into your career is the fact that people want to talk about it. That's. That's one of the most giving and the. The most incredible things. It's what allows us to do this as. As a profession. On the other hand, I suppose these moments become a lot more loaded than we're used to seeing in the World cup racing. And, you know what? We do day in and day out. And every weekend from October until March, we're racing World Cups. And, you know, it's really our. Our little World cup family. But in an Olympic stage, you know, you've got. You definitely have a bright light shining on every. Pretty much everything that you do. And it just becomes a different beast to refocus and simplify, to do a task that you're really pretty familiar with. That's something that we started talking about back in September. We had a, you know, really good, amazing group discussion together with my team. All the staff is. You know, back then, I was starting to suffocate, thinking, feeling the pressure. Well, it wasn't even about pressure. It was like that they. That people don't understand the experience I was having, that I. Maybe the experience I had in Beijing, but more that they wouldn't understand when we arrived here in Cortina. Everything extra that goes into an Olympic performance, aside from the task that we do every day, because when you're with your team, it's like, this is your family, and you're working every single day together. As an athlete, when you show up to the Olympics, it can be isolating. It can be. It doesn't have to be, but there's definitely an isolation factor. When you know, you're alone in your room and you're just taking a shower, you're behind closed doors and you're thinking, you know, oh, my gosh, what if all the what ifs. What if people say this, and what if I don't do that? What if I do do that? What. What's that going to feel like? And where do we go from here? And what does my team think if I. If. If I don't live up to this moment? What if they leave me? What. You know, what if they don't want to be here with me unless it's success? And these are things. They're. Well, my psychologist calls them illogical thoughts. And, yeah, I get that, but I just still think them. So, yeah, what I realized is processing these things verbally with the people who are there that were. That we're going onto the hill together, and we're. We're really unified and cohesive. And, you know, my. My psychologist was also here in person for these two weeks, and that's something I learned from Simone Biles. You know, she was talking about meeting with psychologists daily in Paris. And I was thinking, you know, there's not enough time, that there's not enough time in the day with training and everything, to. To have these Discussions. But in the end, I talked my whole team. We. She was there for all of us to be able to just sort of discuss and continue to process and move forward through the whole Games. And it was such an incredible tool for us to be able to access, you know, our thoughts and question marks and beliefs, too, because at the end of the day then my team knew exactly what to say to me to help me want to race the course.
- [08:53]
A
You know what I think is so awesome about what you're saying, Mikayla, is I think that you being so honest and transparent about the feelings that you're having and talking to your psychologist. I mean, I have a therapist. A lot of folks deal with mental health, and. And I think that we all kind of understand your feeling, even in our smaller scales. We all have our own kind of version of the Olympics to a certain extent. Right? Mine might be in front of the camera when there's, like, a big breaking news story, someone else's might be a presentation at work or, you know, but all of us have that feeling and understanding. Kind of the tools that you use as a Olympic gold medalist in getting through those most difficult moments, I think can be so amazing for other people to hear and understand that, like, you're not perfect, you're vulnerable. You, too, like, question yourself. Even at those moments in which millions of people, not to reiterate that, are watching you not putting their hopes and
- [09:51]
B
dreams now, like, hello, you know, it's okay to talk about it now, but that's, you know, that's. That's also what I just said there. Like, that's also. You know, those are the. Those are the things that load the moment, too. It's like, once you've done it, then you're like, oh, now I'm fine. And that even. Even that in and of itself is
- [10:12]
A
empowering.
- [10:14]
B
It's empowering. It's also probably part of the challenge that athletes face in the Olympics. And, you know, when you talk about mental health, it's like, well, yeah, but I just saw this athlete. They. They did it. They had this most. This inspiring moment, and now they get to talk about it and, you know, waved their medal around. Is like, now I'm not stressed anymore. And it's like, but the purpose. I came here. I came here for the skiing. And, yes, the metal is part of that, but that's. You know, I almost want to put it away and be like, this is. This is my most. This is my beautiful, special symbol. This is. This is actually a gift for having the courage to go out there and try and then being able to execute it. Yes, but this, the medal was actually not the purpose. And it's only now that I have it that I can really honestly say that. Because if I said that and I didn't have it, then that's the criticism, that's the backlash you face. But you know, it's hearing people like Simone or Michael Phelps or anybody talk about psychology and I'm, I really, I feel that actually the moments where I'm not having a problem, but I'm just trying to understand what I'm feeling. And maybe I don't see it as an issue yet, but I'm just sort of like just creating more self awareness. That has been such a wonderful, like life improving process. And I do suggest taking some form of a self awareness journey for every single person on the planet. And what's challenging is that it's not really the most accessible thing. I'm privileged to be able to literally, you know, to be able to pay for my mental health. Not everybody is in that position. So, you know, over the next 10 years, I would love to see these kind of resources become more accessible because it's been such a. It really has improved my life.
- [12:16]
A
I don't know about you, Mikayla, but for me it's also twofold. Like the way in which I talk to myself. Because I'm also hearing you say that it's important to kind of be present, right? Not always to say I gotta get gold, but to think about, I just gotta ski. I gotta put all the effort, you know, all the training that I have worked on to get to this moment into practice, right? I just gotta stay focused, right?
- [12:36]
B
Like, even the difference of like, I have to or I, I've got to or I need to versus I want this. Like, I have the ability and I choose this.
- [12:52]
A
All right, we're gonna take a very quick break, but when we come back, we're gonna have more of my conversation with Mikaela Shifrin, how she felt crossing into the record books, and what drives her beyond the slopes. We'll be right back.
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C
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- [13:19]
A
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- [13:19]
C
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- [13:41]
A
And we're back with. Here's this scoop from NBC News. Here is more of our conversation with Mikayla Shiffrid. So one of the things for me, I think Mikayla, in my own journey, has been kind of combining, yes, like staying present. Right. Understanding what I'm going through, but also having a little bit of faith, like bringing spirituality into my life. That has never been kind of been a part of my life before. I saw, after you won the gold, of course, you, you went to your mom, you hugged her. You also kissed your hand and then touched the snow. I, I, I guess that was for your dad, right? Have you kind of found any spiritual journey through this as well, and ways in which you're talking through your to your dad?
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B
Yeah. So, you know, I had, I had the moment to hug my mom, and I knew that was coming. And she was the first person that I saw, which was incredible because, to be honest, usually she's sort of, she's sort of hiding in the background.
- [14:41]
A
And
- [14:44]
B
when I crossed the finish line, I sort of like, kind of curled into a ball a little bit. That moment was really for my dad and for the, for the team who was there with me every step of the way. So I took a moment, like, to be within myself and to take that for my dad, to take that for my team and to just try to, like, I don't know, bring them into that moment. And then kissing the snow, that was really for the mountain because I've had this entire time for my life, my whole career. You know, you have a relationship with the mountains. And I would not be here doing any of this without, without the mountains and the environment and, you know, the beauty of our world. And it's such a, it's such a fragile existence. And I just, I guess I just wanted to thank the mountain amidst kind
- [15:46]
A
of this, you know, journey that you have had in making sure that you stay healthy mentally under this pressure and, and the competing that you have been doing. You have also said that when you win a gold at the Olympics, at the end of the day, it's just another journal entry. Right. Or maybe a couple of journal entries. What's the next journal entry for you?
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B
Oh, my gosh. Well, I do think that this, this experience from Cortina is going to take a couple more, couple more pages in my journal. I'm not actually used.
- [16:21]
A
By the way, you have a journal. Do you write in your journal every day?
- [16:25]
B
I usually use a notes app if I have random thoughts, but I don't. I don't do regular journaling, but this games. I've been doing a lot of writing, like writing down with a pen on paper. I have like sticky notes all over my bathroom, all over the mirror of like reminders of my. The mentality I wanted to bring to race day. And just like when I wake up in the morning and anytime I go in the bathroom and I see the mirror, the first thing I see are the sticky notes. And I think processing this whole experience is going to keep taking time. Yeah, I'm really grateful for that and hopefully can use this energy through the rest of the season because we've got actually more World cup racing to do than I'll be on snow in the middle of next week training for our upcoming World cup races.
- [17:18]
A
Do you have a mantra that you really focus in on before your races or when you're going through a difficult time in your life? Even something, some phrase that you always
- [17:28]
B
go back to with skiing, I have sort of technical cues which won't make sense to anybody, but I do just repeat them in my head over and over and over again. Yeah, I think here in Cortina, something I kept repeating to myself was like, I want to feel powerful and connected with the mountain. So that was, that was one of the things I wrote down on my mirror and just kept saying I want the moment between the start and the finish. I don't. I accept that the moment after the finish might not be what I want.
- [18:08]
A
Yeah. And again, that's something we can all apply to our own lives. I feel like I want to feel powerful and connected to fill in the blank. Mikaela Shiffrin, you are a superstar. We are so excited for you. Congratulations and thank you for giving us the time.
- [18:26]
B
Thank you so much.
- [18:29]
A
All right, that's gonna do it for us at here's the Scoop from NBC News. I'm Yasmin Vasugin. We'll be back on Monday with whatever the weekend may bring. And if you like what you heard, subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. And you can also subscribe to our daily newsletter, the Inside Scoop. It's a deeper dive on the main stories of the day that comes out every weeknight straight to your inbox. You can sign up for the Inside Scoop through our paid subscription@nbcnews.com.
- [19:08]
C
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