Australian ski racer and Winter Olympian Madi Hoffman has delivered an Australian best on the FIS World Cup circuit overnight, finishing eighth in the opening slalom event in Levi, Finland.
Her P8 finish is the best World Cup result by any Australian alpine skier since Olympic medallist and World Champion Zali Steggall finished eighth at Serre Chevalier, France, on the 5th of December 1999.
Hoffman’s result was especially impressive given she started the first fun in bib 57 and skied her way to 13th at the halfway mark despite the later start order. The 26 year old from Sydney (and Park City, Utah) then delivered the 10th fastest time of the second run to climb five places and finish eighth, with a two-run combined time of 1:54.35.
Her previous FIS World Cup best was 25th in Levi in 2023. Speaking after recording Australia’s best alpine skiing result this century, Hoffman said the scale of the achievement was yet to sink in.
“It hasn’t hit me yet, but I’m definitely proud, especially after a long slog with some injuries,” Hoffman said.
“Tearing both my knees in 2024 and coming back last year, it feels good to be back racing.”
Hoffman said the key to both runs was resisting the urge to change her approach on race day.
“In the first run I chose to trust myself and not try to do anything more or anything less than training,” she said.
“In the second run I thought I’d try to give it a little bit more oomph, but it was the same stuff, trying not to do anything crazy on race day, just normal skiing.”
Hoffman’s Olympic teammate Phoebe Heaydon came agonisingly close to making it two Australians in the second run. The 21-year-old finished 31st in the first run, a World Cup personal best, missing the top 30 cut by just 0.12 seconds.
Germany’s Emma Aicher won the race, ahead of Albania’s Lara Colturi in second and Austria’s Katharina Truppe in third.
