AJ Hurt sidelined as Alpine skiing World Cup season starts

American AJ Hurt, who earned her first Alpine skiing World Cup podiums last winter, is out for the start of this season due to back and shoulder pain she’s had since the end of last season in March.

Hurt posted that she will miss the World Cup season-opening giant slalom in Sölden, Austria, on Saturday (live on Peacock).

“I’m back home now trying to figure out how to get rid of this pain so I can get back in the start gate as soon as possible,” she posted, adding that she hasn’t trained much on snow.

The next race is a slalom in Levi, Finland, on Nov. 16.

Before last season, Hurt’s best career World Cup finish was 18th. She then finished in the top 11 in six races in 2023-24, including a pair of third-place finishes for her first World Cup podiums.

Hurt, 23, became the first U.S. woman other than Mikaela Shiffrin to make a podium in slalom and GS in one season since Sarah Schleper in 2000-01.

Hurt, a Tahoe native who studied engineering at Dartmouth, missed most of the 2022-23 season due to surgery to repair left ankle ligaments.

She made her Olympic debut in 2022, placing 34th in the slalom and not finishing her first run of GS. She was also the 2021 World Junior Championships bronze medalist in the slalom.