‘I couldn’t dream of this at the start of the winter’: Alpine skiing’s Next Gen serve notice

Everyone from Marco Oderamtt (SUI/Stöckli) to Federica Brignone (ITA/Rossignol) via Mikaela Shiffrin (USA/Atomic) has been warned. Alpine skiing’s all-time greats may have excelled once more during the 2024/25 Audi FIS World Cup season, but the rising stars have landed and are ready to snatch their crowns.

Consider this: six months ago none of Franjo von Allmen’s (SUI/Head), Zrinka Ljutic (CRO/Atomic), Alexi Monney (SUI/Stöckli) or Camille Rast (SUI/Head) had ever triumphed in an elite senior global ski race. Now, three of them are world champions, one is a Crystal Globe winner and all four have tasted World Cup glory multiple times.

They are not alone either.

Eighteen men’s and women’s World Cup races were won by skiers aged 25-years-old or younger, while the youngsters also claimed a further 37 podium places.

Here is a closer look at just how the next generation stormed the palace.

Rising Stars prove real deal

In retrospect the 2023/24 Longines Rising Ski Star rankings would have served as a great preview for last season.

Not only did the two winners, Ljutic and Alexander Steen Olsen (NOR/Rossignol) go on to great things – with Ljutic grabbing the women’s Slalom World Cup title and Steen Olsen twice winning World Cup Giant Slalom races – but check out those behind them.

Von Allmen, second in those Longines standings, emerged as a fully-fledged superstar over the course of last season.

The 23-year-old lined up in the first speed race in December having never been on a major Downhill podium. By the end of last month’s World Cup Finals, he was heading to the beach as the reigning world champion and a two-time Downhill World Cup winner.

Add on a Super G win down Wengen’s iconic Lauberhorn, plus a generous smattering of World Cup podiums and a second World Championship gold, secured in the men’s Team Combined, and it was no wonder von Allmen had this to say in Sun Valley:

“Absolutely amazing, I couldn’t dream of this at the start of the winter,” the Swiss youngster beamed.

Fellow 23-year-old Lukas Feurstein (AUT/Head) – third in the previous season’s Longines standings – is also now a genuine contender. Having grabbed a first podium in Beaver Creek, the Austrian then took his maiden win in the closing World Cup Super G in Sun Valley.

It was a very similar story on the women’s side. Although, the protagonists are even fresher faced.

Behind Ljutic in 2023/24 came Lara Colturi (ALB/Blizzard). Now 18, the teenager has had a breakthrough season, turning her long-identified promise into her first World Cup podium finishes – two in Slalom and one in GS.

 Emma Aicher (GER/Head) has announced herself to the big leagues in even more spectacular fashion. A throwback to the past, the 21-year-old is that rarest of specimens in the modern age: a true all-rounder.

Competing in 32 World Cup races across all four disciplines, Aicher burst to prominence in the final month, finishing second and first in the Downhill on successive days in Kvitfjell, NOR, before following up with her maiden Super G victory days later in La Thuile.

Ljutic v Rast: a taste of what's to come?

While all that is great news for Eduard Hallberg (FIN/Fischer), the recently crowned men’s Longines Rising Ski Star 2024/25, the women’s champion is more familiar.

A second Longines award in succession is mighty impressive for Ljutic, even if her eyes were on bigger prizes.

Her season-long Slalom battle with 25-year-old Camille Rast (SUI/Head) even managed to often take the headlines away from the legendary Mikaela Shiffrin (USA/Atomic). Having both started the campaign yet to taste top-level success, the duo finished it as arguably the GOAT’s biggest competition.

Three victories for the Croatian to the Swiss’ two just kept her ahead in the Globe race but Rast got her own back at the World Championships in February, sealing a first ever global gold.

Hitting new heights

Alice Robinson (NZL/Salomon) and Atle Lie McGrath (NOR/Head) may have started last season as more familiar names, but the pair, 23 and 24 respectively, are by most metrics still in the infancy of their careers. And both took their skiing to new levels.

After catapulting onto the scene as a 17-year-old in 2019, Robinson found a level of consistency in 2024/25 that not only impressed but came agonisingly close to delivering a first ever Crystal Globe for New Zealand. After hitting the podium on all but one of her preceding GS races – a streak that included a first win for almost four years – Robinson skied out in the World Cup Finals to end 60 points shy of Brignone at the top of the standings.

She did however become New Zealand’s first ever World Championship medal winner, taking silver in the GS.

McGrath was also a world silver medallist in Saalbach. That capped a fine season for the youngest of Norway’s Slalom quartet, with a long-awaited win in Wengen also a highlight.

Setting the scene for 2024/25

Remarkably, there are a host of other names demanding entry on this list of rising stars.

Not least, Alexis Monney (SUI/Stöckli). The 25-year-old stood at the start gate of the third Downhill of the season in Bormio in December 2024 having just finished 36^th in the Val Gardena race and with a best ever World Cup finish of eighth. No matter. He went on to win down the Stelvio, come second in Kitzbühel’s Hahnenkamm and then grab World Championship bronze in Saalbach.

Lauren Macuga’s (USA/Rossignol) 2024/25 was almost as good. Now 22, the USA skier also turned promise into medals in Saalbach, claiming Super G bronze just weeks after nabbing a first World Cup win in St. Anton.

She, like the rest of those born this millennium will no doubt be relishing a summer of yet further progression and a winter to come that promises so much to so many.