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Mikaela Shiffrin and Aleksander Kilde- Skier Mikaela Shiffrin is back on the slopes following a life-threatening injury in November, claiming her 101st World Cup win on Thursday, March 27
- Shiffrin tells PEOPLE that the win came after a difficult few months of recovery, for both her and her fiancé, fellow skier Aleksander Aamodt Kilde
- The couple is now set on making the 2026 Winter Olympics
Mikaela Shiffrin may face obstacles, but she's unstoppable!
The most decorated skier in World Cup history spoke with PEOPLE exclusively following yet another victorious season on Tuesday, April 1, opening up about the ups and downs she experienced on and off the slopes along the way.
Shiffrin, 30, earned her 101st World Cup win at the finals in Sun Valley, Idaho on March 27, an impressive feat in itself and a near-incomprehensible accomplishment after sustaining a life-threatening injury from a ski crash in November.
At the same time, Shiffrin's fiancé, Aleksander Aamodt Kilde, has been working back from a "brutal" crash in Switzerland in Jan. 2024. He underwent surgery and spent the last 15 months in rehabilitation, and hasn't yet returned to the slopes since.
"We both have been in survival mode for the last year and a half," Shiffrin tells PEOPLE exclusively of both her and her fiancé in the wake of their respective accidents. "Total survival mode," she emphasizes.
Mikaela Shiffrin/instagram
Mikaela Shiffrin and her fiancé Aleksander Aamodt Kilde"This season has been pretty hard in particular because of his injury, also because of mine," Shiffrin explains. "The time that we've been able to spend together hasn't been super high quality."
Shiffrin's injury at the Stifel Killington Cup in Vermont last November meant that she and Kilde were both at home for once, but because she "wasn't moving," they struggled to enjoy their time.
"I didn't want to be touched. It was painful to do everything," recalls Shiffrin, who needed surgery to treat a puncture wound in her abdomen after she hit a gate and was "stabbed" by a sharp object during the fall.
"It was like coughing, sneezing and laughing hurt," Shiffrin says.
