Olympic sports weekend preview: speed skating trials, Mikaela Shiffrin's streak

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In Olympic sports this weekend, the U.S. speed skating trials for the Milan Cortina Games run from Friday through Monday in Milwaukee, live on NBC Sports and Peacock.

Jordan Stolz, the world’s top-ranked man in the 500m, 1000m and 1500m, and Erin Jackson, the 2022 Olympic women’s 500m gold medalist, headline the trials at the Pettit Center, Stolz’s home rink.

While Stolz and Jackson already locked in their Olympic spots through international results, the U.S. team will be finalized through trials results, with two-time Olympic medalist Brittany Bowe among those looking to secure places.

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The Olympic Speed Skating Trials air live on NBC Sports and Peacock from Jan. 2-5.

The women's Alpine skiing World Cup visits Kranjska Gora, Slovenia, on Saturday (giant slalom) and Sunday (slalom).

Mikaela Shiffrin has won the last six World Cup slaloms dating back to last season and can tie the longest slalom win streak of her career.

She’ll also look to make more progress in the giant slalom, where her best finish this season is fourth place.

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NBC Sports, Peacock and skiandsnowboard.live combine to air the 2025-26 FIS Alpine skiing World Cup.

Jessie Diggins has a big lead in the Tour de Ski, a Tour de France-like stage competition that is made up of World Cup races.

The Tour is through four of six stages, all in Italy, with the last two stages this weekend at the 2026 Olympic venue of Val di Fiemme, Italy. Diggins is the lone North American woman or man to win a Tour de Ski, doing so in 2020-21 and 2023-24.

Diggins, an Olympic medalist of every color who announced this will be her last season before retirement, also leads the World Cup overall standings nearly halfway through the season.

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A World Cup in Calgary marks the third of four U.S. Olympic qualifying competitions in ski halfpipe.

Up to four men and four women will make up the Olympic team. Two-time Olympic medalist Alex Ferreira is so far the lone athlete to clinch a spot on the team. Nick Goepper, a three-time Olympic slopestyle medalist, is one of eight Americans who made Saturday’s 14-man final.

If an American man or woman wins in Calgary, they will clinch an Olympic spot.
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The bobsled World Cup resumes in Winterberg, Germany, on Saturday and Sunday.

Three American female drivers are ranked in the top seven in the world: three-time Olympic gold medalist Kaillie Humphries, who at the most recent World Cup earned her first win since having son Aulden in June 2024; 2025 monobob world champion Kaysha Love and five-time Olympic medalist Elana Meyers Taylor. All three are on track to qualify for the Milan Cortina Games.

The world’s top two drivers this season come from powerhouse Germany: Laura Nolte and Lisa Buckwitz.

The luge World Cup stops in Sigulda, Latvia, on Saturday and Sunday. Summer Britcher and Ashley Farquharson each made the women's singles podium at the last two World Cups held in Park City and Lake Placid.

It will be a challenge for Americans to replicate that success now that the circuit is back in Europe, where Germans and Austrians traditionally dominate. The next two weekends are the last two World Cups before the Olympic team is determined.