At this point, Mikaël Kingsbury’s moguls dominance is well-established: any time the Canadian competes, he is expected to win.
It’s a sensation CBC Sports analyst Mike Atkinson stated reminds him of one athlete specifically.
“What Tiger is to golf, Mikaël is to mogul skiing,” Atkinson said.
Kingsbury’s career statistics are Tiger-esque. He collected nine consecutive Crystal Globes as the top moguls competitor from 2012 through 2020. An injury-riddled 2020-21 season prevented him from making it 10 straight, but the 29-year-old is now right back in contention.
He has landed on the podium in 102 of 121 career World Cup starts, winning 72 of them.
“That’s crazy. That’s just crazy. There’s been other people that have dominated and produced results, but not to the extent of Kingsbury. It is a league of his own,” Atkinson said.
At the Beijing Games, Kingsbury became the first man to win three career Olympic moguls medals.
But considering his dominance, the fact that it was his second silver to just one gold stings.
“I thought he did a really outstanding job of holding his head high while flushed with disappointment. I just thought, ‘That’s a true champ right there.’ He lost. He got beat. That wasn’t his day,” Atkinson said.
The Deux-Montagnes, Que., native should still end the season with plenty of hardware.
Kingsbury enters this weekend’s World Cup Finals in France with a shot at the overall titles in moguls and dual moguls.
“He’s in it to win it,” Atkinson said. “He’s had his time off [after] the Olympics. He’s had his time to digest everything that’s happened and he wants it. He wouldn’t be there if he didn’t.” Action from France starts with the moguls competition on Friday at 1 p.m. ET and continues on Saturday with dual moguls at 10:40 a.m. ET.
