Austria Upsets Favorites to Win Olympic Team Combined Gold

Team combined, Austria wins gold

Austria's Ariane Raedler and Katharina Huber win unexpected Olympic gold in team combined, edging out Germany and USA.

“We couldn't count on gold, but you never do...”

Austria's Ariane Raedler and Katharina Huber pulled off a stunning upset, winning the women's team combined Olympic gold in alpine skiing. They edged out Germany's Kira Weidle-Winkelmann and Emma Aicher, who took silver, by just 0.05 seconds. Meanwhile, USA's Jacqueline Wiles and Paula Moltzan secured bronze, narrowly beating Breezy Johnson and Mikaela Shiffrin's time by 0.06 seconds.

Shiffrin, a dominant force in slalom skiing, had a disappointing run, finishing 15th in the slalom leg after Johnson had topped the downhill portion. This result ends Johnson's hopes of a “double double” - holding both world downhill and team combined titles and adding Olympic golds in both.

The Olympic stage can be cruel, and for Lindsey Vonn and Mikaela Shiffrin, fourth place was a tough pill to swallow. They had been dominating the sport, but sometimes that's not enough.

“It was a surprise, a gold medal for us,” said Huber, reflecting on the unexpected turn of events. Shiffrin had been poised to win, but it wasn't meant to be.

🥇 Ariane RAEDLER and Katharina HUBER climb to the top of the podium in the alpine skiing women's team combined 👏

Austria's first alpine skiing gold of #MilanoCortina2026 — Raedler's first Olympic medal and Huber's 2nd Olympic gold after the 2022 team gold.

What a dramatic… pic.twitter.com/m5M7AxT2ll

— The Olympic Games (@Olympics) February 10, 2026

The medalists stood on the podium, a bittersweet moment for the fans and athletes alike.

Breezy Johnson's lightning-fast downhill run put Mikaela Shiffrin in pole position to grab gold, but the skiing superstar struggled in the slalom, finishing 15th and dropping her and Johnson to fourth place.

Shiffrin, who has dominated slalom this season with seven wins out of eight, seemed off her game on the sunny slopes of Cortina d'Ampezzo's Olimpia delle Tofane piste, unable to capitalize on Johnson's lead.

Mikaela Shiffrin's slalom run was surprisingly slow, ranking only 15th fastest - a shocking result for the dominant skier who's usually a second ahead of her rivals. This disappointing performance brought back memories of her 2022 Beijing Olympics, where she left without a medal despite being a top contender.

Shiffrin, a three-time Olympic medallist, has two more chances to turn things around: the giant slalom on Feb 15 and the slalom on Feb 18.

“I didn't quite find a comfort level that allows me to produce full speed," said the American, who added that the "feeling under the feet” was not there on softer snow than experienced this season.

“So I'm going to have to learn what to do, what to adjust in the short time we have before the other tech races. There's always something to learn.”

Breezy Johnson's fourth-place finish in the team combined event dashed her hopes of a 'double double', which would've seen her hold both world and Olympic titles in downhill and team combined. Johnson had won gold in the individual downhill, but Mikaela Shiffrin's slalom struggles put them out of medal contention.

Emma Aicher, the Swedish-born German skier, took silver in the team combined, her second medal of the Games after finishing runner-up in the downhill. Remarkably, Aicher was the fastest in the slalom leg, edging out Switzerland's Wendy Holdener by 0.03 seconds.

Katharina Huber was 10th in the slalom, but Ariane Raedler's strong downhill run set up Austria's gold medal win. “Katharina, she really kept it together in the end,” said Austrian Alpine skiing director Christian Mitter, praising Huber's composure.

This was the first time the team combined event featured pairs of skiers, with one speed specialist and one technical expert. “We couldn't count on gold, but you never do... They were good runs, Olympic performances,” Mitter added, highlighting the Austrians' impressive performance.Here are some fitting title and search description options:

Mikaela Shiffrin falls short of a podium finish by 0.06, as Austria's Ariane Raedler and Katharina Huber rule in the inaugural women's team combined event.

🥇 🇦🇹 A. Raedler/K. Huber
🥈 🇩🇪 K. Weidle-Winklemann/E. Aicher
🥉 🇺🇸 J. Wiles/P. Moltzan#MilanoCortina2026 #ITsYourVibe pic.twitter.com/QeR26UaCls

— Archive (@ArchiveInt) February 10, 2026