Austria’s Michaela Dorfmeister achieved an impressive performance during the '99-'00 season by winning four GS races and the World Cup standings after previously never scoring a decent result! In fact, the Olympic silver medals winner in super G from Nagano was amazed by her results. In the previous seasons, she has been foremost a speed specialist as well as one of the most outgoing personalities on the women’s tour.

During the '98-'99 season, Michaela tried four times to qualify in GS – without any success. So she was already pleased after the opening GS at Tignes where she was able to score some points, but she reached even more later on. After finishing top-15 at Copper Mountain, Colorado, she won on the steep slope at Serre Chevalier, France. A week later, she won again in Val d’Isère. In January, she won two more races, in Slovenia’s Maribor and in Germany’s Berchtesgaden where she beat Italy’s Karen Putzer, a strong leader in the first leg, by a mere 2/100 of a second.

She showed her joy by doing a "Tomba" roll in the finish area, as Alberto did after winning that event in his best days.

She also won a super G in Santa Caterina, but her results in the speed events were not from the same calibre, yet she still managed to take over the lead in the Overall World Cup standings. But the pressure was tough on her – especially since her toughest rival was her teammate and good friend Renate Goetschl. She lost the lead at Are, where she skied out in the GS.

In downhill, she had a hard time to glide as fast and smoothly than in the past years and she could only score a single podium in Innsbruck.

At the end she was pleased by her season and her GS World Cup title – her first ever in her career. She said at Bormio that she has learned a lot in that single winter, promising to fight for more in 2001. At 27, she is close to become one of the veterans of her team.

The Austrian, who grew up near Vienna, scored her first points in 1992 to win a World Cup downhill in December 1995 at St Anton. Michaela needed a long time to confirm this success and win another important race. In 1997 and 1998 “Dorfi” was quite confused in her mind and she could not put her acts together except at the Olympics at Nagano where she came in 2nd in Super-G, only a 1/100 behind America’s Picabo Street. This excellent result and the strong support of her coach Karl Frehsner helped her to regain her confidence and find a new motivation for the following season. Dorfmeister trainer harder and learned to be more focused on course. She accumulated a series of top-3 results in the speed events in January 1999 before winning her first Super-G in March at St Moritz, Switzerland, for once ahead of her teammate Renate Goetschl. She has been close to beat her several times in downhill, including at Vail where she lost the title by 5/100 after having clocked the best intermediate time. She also clinched bronze in Super-G in Colorado. In total she stood almost ten times on the podium during the 1998/99 season – a good reason for her to shoot for the stars in 2001 and 2002. She is definitely one of the great characters on the women circuit.

A very smart and humorous person, Michaela Dorfmeister often surprises the media with her jokes and direct answers. She also likes to say "we" when speaking about herself!