History beckons for Mikaela Shiffrin on Friday when the American skier competes in one of her best events.

Shiffrin is seeking a record-tying 86th win on the World Cup skiing circuit, a number that would equal Swedish great Ingemar Stenmark’s mark from the 1970s and 80s.

Shiffrin earned win No. 85 six weeks ago. She had three chances to match Stenmark’s record last week but those were all speed races — not Shiffrin’s specialty.

On Friday, Shiffrin will again try to make history in a giant slalom in Are, Sweden. That will be followed by a slalom on Saturday. Shiffrin has won 19 World Cup giant slaloms and 52 slaloms in her career, along with an Olympic gold medal in each.

Stenmark has said he does not plan to be in Are, preferring to watch on television, but he gave Shiffrin an enthusiastic endorsement in a recent interview with The Associated Press.

“She’s much better than I was. You cannot compare,” said Stenmark, an all-time great in both slalom and giant slalom who preferred not to race in downhill.

Shiffrin, though, can do it all. In the two super-Gs and one downhill last weekend in Kvitfjell, Norway, she placed between fourth and seventh. Those results were enough for her to win her fifth overall World Cup title with six races remaining this season.

“I can take a little bit of weight fof my shoulders,” Shiffrin said in Kvitfjell after moving into second place on the all-time women’s list, one behind Annemarie Moser-Pröll. “That was like the big, big goal for me this season.”

The title also moved Shiffrin ahead of former United States teammate Lindsey Vonn, who won four overall titles and 82 World Cup races before retiring four years ago.

Now it’s back to chasing Stenmark’s record, and it’s looking good. Three of Shiffrin’s 19 victories in giant slalom came in her last three starts in the event, all wire-to-wire wins in January.

And the Swedish resort of Are could also provide a boost. That’s where a 17-year-old Shiffrin first won a World Cup race, in slalom in December 2012.

It took until her 24th career start to get that first victory, but her win rate has soared since to 35% — 85 wins in 244 races.

If No. 86 eludes Shiffrin in Sweden, she has up to four more chances next week at the season-ending World Cup Finals in Soldeu, Andorra.

She will turn 28 on Monday, two days before racing starts in the tiny principality tucked in the mountains between France and Spain.

“I think she can win more than 100,” Stenmark said. “It depends on how many years she continues. But for sure 100.”

Shiffrin has not publicly set such a lofty target, but it can be within reach if she pursues a sixth overall title to match Moser-Pröll, a 1970s downhill standout from Austria.

This week Shiffrin used her Twitter account to set a more cerebral goal: “Strive to be modest in the face of hubris.”

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GENEVA — Sweden emerging as the front-runner in a troubled search for a 2030 Olympics host is as much a surprise in Stockholm as elsewhere.

The year started with Sweden not on the radar of a Winter Games race where longtime favorite Sapporo faded during a criminal investigation of alleged bribery linked to the recent Tokyo Olympics. Salt Lake City is targeting 2034.

In Sweden, memories are also fresh of a bruising loss for Stockholm-Are against Milan-Cortina d’Ampezzo in the 2026 Olympics vote — the Nordic country’s eighth beaten candidate for the Winter Games.

The picture changed when Swedish officials met last month in Switzerland with International Olympic Committee leaders who faced uncertainty and time running out to find a 2030 host.

“We had a meeting in Lausanne in mid-January after the holidays,” Swedish Olympic official Hans von Uthmann told The Associated Press. “On our journey back we realized, ‘Hey, there really is an opening.’”

Urging caution just one week after the Sweden Olympic Committee formally announced its interest, Von Uthmann said there is a June target to complete a feasibility study he is overseeing to reboot most of the 2026 plan.

Still, it could be Sweden’s for the taking if it can revive most of the 2026 plan and persuade more lawmakers and voters for support.

It would certainly solve a problem for the IOC, which already postponed a decision it had wanted to make this year.

“We see clearly the window of opportunity,” Von Uthmann said, though adding “obviously timing in terms of the world around us is difficult.”

The Russian invasion of Ukraine created local and global issues for a Swedish bid, both in real world politics and inside the Olympic bubble.

“We are humbly aware that we are in the midst of an extremely difficult finance situation in Sweden, not to mention the NATO application,” Von Uthmann said, referring to the government’s diplomatic move to seek greater protection from possible Russian aggression.

Von Uthmann confirmed there will be an approach to Latvia to use its bobsled track at Sigulda that again seems essential for any Swedish bid.

That sets up an intriguing potential conflict for the IOC’s separate Olympic Games and international relations departments.

Sweden and Latvia are among European Olympic bodies taking the toughest stand against the IOC’s push to reintegrate some Russian and Belarusian athletes into qualifying events for the 2024 Paris Olympics.

“It is way too early, we are not there yet. The war is going on,” Von Uthmann said, repeating Sweden’s clear position in the current most heated Olympic debate.

“We feel it is not the time to start to discuss letting Russian and Belarusian athletes or officials into the Olympic family again,” he said.

Domestic issues in Stockholm may yet stop any candidacy moving forward, four years after the IOC clearly noted skepticism at home for the 2026 bid.

“Cost-wise there are many questions and we need to convince and show the Swedish population that this is actually to the advantage of Sweden,” Von Uthmann said.

Two building projects suggested in 2026 — for biathlon/cross-country skiing and speed skating, the sport of Swedish Olympic champion Nils van der Poel — are unlikely to be included this time. Existing venues would take priority as the IOC prefers.

Athlete villages are the typical big-ticket Olympic projects, though Stockholm needs new housing so support from city authorities is expected, Von Uthmann suggested. No political commitments have yet been asked for nor given, and it is unclear if a public vote will be called.

The IOC has pointed Swedish officials to a July 2024 deadline — at its members’ meeting on the eve of the Paris Olympics — to find a 2030 Winter Games host. At just 5-1/2 years before the opening ceremony, it would be the latest pick of a games host for any modern Olympics.

“We had a very strong concept and very good offer for the 2026 Olympics,” Von Uthmann said, “and we will build on that.”

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From a prodigiously talented 15-year-old to the most decorated female skier of all-time, Mikaela Shiffrin has done quite a lot in only 12 years.

The American skier won her record-breaking 83rd victory Tuesday in her 238th race on the World Cup circuit, the globe-trotting competition for the best skiers on the planet and followed it up with her 84th World Cup win the next day..

Shiffrin, who broke a tie with former teammate Lindsey Vonn by winning a giant slalom in Italy, has also won two Olympic gold medals and one silver, plus six world championship titles and five more medals from that biennial competition.

But it is her World Cup career — and now her pursuit of Ingemar Stenmark’s once mythical total of 86 wins — that has made her one of the greatest skiers in history.

WORLD CUP

Shiffrin’s racing career on the World Cup circuit started two days before her 16th birthday in March 2011 in the Czech Republic. Wearing bib No. 46 in a giant slalom, she finished outside the top 30, meaning she didn’t qualify for a second run.

Her first slalom, the discipline she would come to dominate with 51 victories, was the next day and again she finished outside the top 30.

Shiffrin’s first podium came in December 2011. Wearing bib No. 40, she was third behind ski greats Marlies Schild, a childhood idol, and Tina Maze.

The first of her 84 wins — and counting — came one year later in Are, Sweden, on Dec. 20, 2012.

Incredibly, Shiffrin won the World Cup slalom title that season, adding two more wins before a dramatic World Cup Finals race in Lenzerheide, Switzerland. A spectacular second run overhauled a 1.17-second lead by Maze, who had a record-setting season but was left distraught after losing to a rival who turned 18 three days earlier.

Shiffrin won five season-long World Cup slalom titles in six seasons. The streak was broken after a December 2015 injury in Are during race warmups.

The inevitable first overall World Cup title came at the age of 22 in the 2016-17 season when Shiffrin won 11 races.

It was the start of three straight titles. The next season included a first downhill win in Lake Louise, Canada — in only her fourth start.

Shiffrin won a record 17 races in 2019, tallied 2,204 World Cup points — second only to Maze in skiing history — and got top-five places in all but one of her 26 events.

In January 2020, she looked set for a fourth title, taking a 370-point lead after two speed race wins in Bansko, Bulgaria. Then family tragedy struck.

FAMILY TIES

Shiffrin’s mother, Eileen, has always traveled with her in an entourage of coaches and mentors. Her father, Jeff, was a familiar sight at races, readily recognizable with a bushy mustache taking photographs around the finish area.

In February 2020, Jeff Shiffrin died after an accident at the family home in Colorado.

Shiffrin flew home from Europe to begin a grieving process she has been frank and open about. After skipping several weeks of races and losing her lead in the standings, her scheduled return was halted by the COVID-19 pandemic, which ended the season.

A foundation to help young skiers was set up in her father’s name, the Jeff Shiffrin Athlete Resiliency Fund.

Shiffrin then won a fourth overall World Cup title last year, bouncing back from a disappointing showing at the Beijing Olympics.

She is now set to earn a fifth giant crystal globe in March with a clear lead fueled by nine victories this season following Tuesday’s win.

OLYMPICS

At 18, Shiffrin stepped on the Olympic stage like she belonged there.

A fifth-place finish in the giant slalom at the 2014 Sochi Games preceded a dominating wire-to-wire win in slalom. Shiffrin finished more than a half-second ahead of Schild, the best slalom skier in the world at the time.

Four years later in Pyeongchang, Shiffrin took gold in giant slalom a day before her fourth-place finish in slalom. She later took silver in Alpine combined, a race made up of a downhill run and a slalom run.

BEIJING BLIP

Shiffrin was expected to be the star of the 2022 Beijing Olympics with medal hopes in all five women’s events. What happened next was bewildering even to her.

Shiffrin skied out of the giant slalom and slalom within a few seconds of each run, did not truly contend for a medal in downhill and super-G, and failed to finish the slalom in Alpine combined.

“I’m certainly questioning a lot,” Shiffrin said after her fifth failure. “I’m really disappointed. And I’m really frustrated.”

She will still be only 30 when the 2026 Milan-Cortina Olympics roll around. Women’s races are scheduled for Cortina d’Ampezzo, where she won four medals at the 2021 world championships.

WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS

Shiffrin’s first worlds-level race was at the 2011 juniors in Crans-Montana, Switzerland, when she was still only 15. Racing in slalom with a cold, she placed third behind two rivals both four years older.

Starting in 2013, Shiffrin won four straight world titles in slalom. The streak ended with bronze in 2021 in Cortina, but she took home four medals from that event, including gold in Alpine combined.

The combined was her sixth world title. In total, she has 11 medals from 13 events at the worlds. The other two results were top-10 finishes in giant slalom as a teenager.

The next world championships begin on Feb. 6 in the French resorts of Courchevel and Meribel. Five more medals could be in play.

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