Italian Federica Brignone will go into a home Olympics as a reigning world champion, while Minnesotan Paula Moltzan is a first-time individual world medalist, 12-plus years after her debut at ski racing’s highest level.
Brignone, 34, broke her own records as the oldest woman to win an individual Alpine skiing world medal and gold medal, taking the giant slalom on Thursday in Saalbach, Austria.
She prevailed by nine tenths of a second over Alice Robinson, who became the first Alpine skier from New Zealand to make a world podium.
Moltzan snagged bronze by one hundredth over Thea Louise Stjernesund of Norway combining times from two runs. Moltzan, a 30-year-old who has spent summers as a whitewater rafting guide, extended the U.S. run to a medal in each of the first four women’s events at these worlds.
ALPINE SKIING WORLDS: Results | Broadcast Schedule
Brignone spent the first six years of her life in Milan, scurrying on plastic skis around her family’s carpeted apartment. While Milan co-hosts next February’s Olympics, the women’s Alpine events will be at Cortina d’Ampezzo.
Brignone previously won two Olympic medals and two world medals in the GS starting in 2011, all silver or bronze. She earned her first global title in 2023 in the individual combined, which is no longer on the Olympic or world program.
This season, Brignone has already became the oldest woman to win a World Cup race in downhill, super-G and giant slalom. She leads the standings for the World Cup overall title, the biggest annual prize in ski racing which she previously won in 2019-20.
“This was my dream to be a gold medal in GS,” she said. “Yeah, I’ve been dreaming of this moment for many, many years. I was always second. This is just, yeah, one of the best days of my life, I think.”
Moltzan debuted on the World Cup at age 18 in 2012, then was cut from the U.S. team in 2016. She then spent three NCAA All-America seasons at Vermont before breaking into the top 10 of a World Cup race for the first time at age 26, recharged during COVID-19 in a shed gym in the middle of the woods.
She has made four World Cup podiums across three disciplines (parallel, slalom and GS), emerging as the U.S.’ second-best technical skier after Mikaela Shiffrin.
Moltzan was asked moments after Thursday’s race how she translated an all-out attitude into her skiing.
“A lot of hard work, some practice and a lot of disappointment,” she said on Peacock.
Earlier at these worlds, Moltzan was part of fourth-place teams in the mixed-gender parallel event (which the U.S. won in 2023 with Moltzan) and in the combined.
In the combined, she was the last skier to go in the final slalom run after teammate Lauren Macuga had the fastest downhill run by 23 hundredths. Moltzan posted the 15th-fastest slalom run. Macuga and Moltzan’s combined time was 11 hundredths shy of a medal.
“It was extremely motivating,” Moltzan said of the combined. “I’ll quote (American teammate) River Radamus, ‘There’s nothing worse than getting fourth on the big stage.'”
Now, after years of anticipating which American women could follow Shiffrin onto major championship podiums, three have done so in the last eight days: Macuga (super-G bronze), Breezy Johnson (downhill gold, team combined gold with Shiffrin) and now Moltzan.
It’s the first time in 40 years that three different U.S. women have won an individual medal at worlds. Shiffrin races her lone individual event at these worlds in Saturday’s slalom, where she can make it four for the first time ever.
Shiffrin, who won the GS at the last worlds in 2023, didn’t race it Thursday. She is going through “some mental obstacles” specific to the GS discipline after tearing oblique muscles in a Nov. 30 GS crash.
Worlds continue Friday with the men’s giant slalom, live at 3:45 and 7:15 a.m. ET on Peacock.
Paula Moltzan, after three years at school, seizes second ski racing chance
Paula Moltzan, after a three-year break to go to college, is bidding for her first Winter Olympics in Alpine skiing.
FIS World Alpine Skiing Championships 2025 Results — Women’s Giant Slalom
Gold: Federica Brignone (ITA) — 2:22.71
Silver: Alice Robinson (NZL) — +.90
Bronze: Paula Moltzan (USA) — +2.62
4. Thea Louise Stjernesund (NOR) — +2.63
5. Lara Gut-Behrami (SUI) — +2.88
6. Sara Hector (SWE) — +2.88
7. Lara Colturi (ALB) — +3.50
8. Zrinka Ljutic (CRO) — +3.54
9. Lena Duerr (GER) — +3.56
10. Britt Richardson (CAN) — +3.89
13. AJ Hurt (USA) — +4.60
19. Nina O’Brien (USA) — +4.91
22. Katie Hensien (USA) — +5.76
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