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Mikaela Shiffrin won almost every race by over two seconds in her breakthrough season. The next year, when she won by six tenths of a second, people said she was getting slow. The victory itself wasn't questioned, but suddenly winning alone wasn't good enough. She had to win by more. This shift created something she'd never experienced before: performance anxiety so severe she was vomiting at the start of almost every race. Not from fear of losing, but from fear of the disappointment that came with not exceeding expectations that had become completely unrealistic. Even people closest to her would say things like "it'd be so great if you could just stomp on this race." She knew the expectations weren't realistic, but she didn't know how to explain that. So she raced anyway, and people took four to five years to catch up to the fact that her early dominance was a moment in time, not a permanent standard.
The breakthrough came from recognizing that exhaustion isn't weakness. After winning her 85th World Cup victory, everyone assumed number 86 the next day was a done deal. But she'd raced seven times in ten days across Europe. She was mentally and emotionally disconnected, not because she lacked skill or drive, but because she was human and tired. Sometimes you just need one recovery day. She's learned to recognize when expectations are unrealistic, when media questions are trying to insinuate feelings rather than ask honestly, and most importantly, that people will eventually catch up. Excellence doesn't mean you have to exceed impossible standards every single time. Sometimes winning by six tenths is still extraordinary, even if two seconds was once possible.
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