Olympic champion Michelle Gisin retires from skiing after St. Moritz crash

Retirement announced on the Titlis

Michelle Gisin has ended her skiing career. She announced the decision on Tuesday, 3 November 2026, first in a video on Instagram and then at a press conference on the Titlis, her local mountain above Engelberg at 3,238 metres. The announcement closes a rehabilitation that had been aimed at a return to racing. Gisin was still in build-up training until the end and had not yet settled on a final decision. A comeback had been considered only after the home World Championships in Crans-Montana, scheduled for 1 to 14 February 2027.

The crash in St. Moritz

Gisin crashed during a training run for the downhill in St. Moritz in December 2025, which SRF dates to 11 December on the Corviglia. Tages Anzeiger reports she hit the safety nets at 110 km/h. The fall caused a cruciate and inner ligament tear in her left knee, wrist injuries and a serious neck injury, and NZZ also lists two partial tendon tears in her left shoulder. After months of rehabilitation she resumed training in the gym and later returned to the snow. In early August she put her position this way:

“I want to decide on the skis and not end such an incredibly beautiful, successful career on the physio table.”

Describing the medical verdict after the fall, Gisin said the doctors told her how close it had been:

“The doctors explained it was incredibly close. I could have been paralysed.”

Olympic gold and a long World Cup record

Gisin won Olympic combined gold at Pyeongchang in 2018 and again at Beijing in 2022, where she also took super-G bronze. She won two World Championship combined medals, in 2017 and 2021. Her only World Cup victory came in the slalom at Semmering in 2020, and she finished with 21 World Cup podiums in total. She became the first Swiss woman since Vreni Schneider to reach the podium in all five World Cup disciplines. Her World Cup debut came on 29 December 2012 at Semmering, and her last start was the super-G at Sun Valley on 23 March 2025, where she finished 17th. Her starts were spread across all disciplines, as the breakdown below shows.

Slalom103

Giant slalom60

Downhill59

Super-G58

Slalom

103 starts

Giant slalom

60 starts

Downhill

59 starts

Super-G

58 starts

Data from the article text

Highs, lows and the switch of skis

She finished third in the overall World Cup in 2021 and fifth in the season after. Before the 2021/22 season she contracted Pfeiffer's glandular fever, and she fought her way back to third place in the giant slalom at Kranjska Gora. After switching from Rossignol to Salomon skis following the Beijing Games, her results fell short of her earlier level, and she reached the podium only twice more. The timeline below traces the main milestones from her debut to her retirement.

What comes next

Gisin married Italian giant slalom specialist Luca De Aliprandini this summer, and she remains connected to the sport as an ambassador for the 2027 World Championships in Crans-Montana. Her sister Dominique and brother Marc were also professional skiers, and with her retirement the last of the Engelberg siblings leaves the World Cup. Gisin is due to appear on SRF zwei's Sportpanorama on Sunday, 8 November, from 18:00, where she will look back on the past months and her career.