“The Chinese people look at the sport and see Mikaela, and they quickly figure out that her path came through Burke, and they see that as an opportunity,” said Booker as he leaned on his poles between runs last Wednesday and observed his student body in action on the same steep slope where Shiffrin polished her talent. She won the super-G title at the world championships in Are, Sweden, last week, and after surprisingly choosing to skip the combined event and the downhill, it would come as no surprise if she won two more golds this week, with the giant slalom on Thursday and slalom on Saturday. What better template at this stage than Shiffrin, who with 56 World Cup victories at age 23 appears well on her way to becoming the most prolific winner in the sport’s history?Īfter claiming the last two World Cup overall titles, she is in the midst of what could turn out to be her most dominant season. With Beijing set to host the next Winter Olympics in 2022, the Chinese are pursuing proven methods of developing their Alpine skiing talent. The explanation for the surge in interest? Mikaela Shiffrin, who attended Burke, an elite and expensive boarding school in the bucolic corner of Vermont known as the Northeast Kingdom. “We have two this year, but I think we could easily fill half our school with Chinese students right now,” said Willy Booker, the academy’s head of school. After nearly 50 years of training and educating promising ski racers, Burke Mountain Academy has its first students from China.
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