MERIBEL, France -- Mikaela Shiffrin didn't hold on to a first-run lead and was beaten to gold by unheralded Canadian skier Laurence St-Germain in the women's slalom at the world championships Saturday.
The American finished 0.57 seconds behind St-Germain after the final run to settle for silver.
St-Germain's victory marked the first gold for Canada in women's slalom since Anne Heggtveit won at the 1960 Olympics in Squaw Valley, California, which also counted as the world championships. It was also the first world title for a Canadian woman in any discipline since 2003 when Melanie Turgeon won the downhill.
Lena Duerr of Germany was 0.69 behind and won bronze.
"Today was incredible, just a joy to race," said Shiffrin, whose medal added to the gold she won in the giant slalom Thursday, two days after she and head coach Mike Day split, and the silver in the super-G last week. "Especially after the last weeks and everything that happened, I kind of thought if I can do some of my best skiing.
"Everybody is tired, and it's the end of a long push. I was so happy with my first run and really happy with a lot of sections on the second run. And here and there I backed it off a little bit and then it's not enough for gold."
The slalom was Shiffrin's fourth event in 12 days at worlds. The American didn't finish her opening event last week when she straddled a gate in the slalom portion of the combined before winning a medal in each of the next three.
"At the end of two weeks, if I'm a little bit tired, I cannot move quick enough in slalom," Shiffrin said. "I mean, I can move quick enough in slalom, of course, I have a silver medal, but there is somebody who is going to be able to do it faster. That's always the case."
Shiffrin, the 2014 Olympic champion, won the world slalom title four times between 2013 and 2019 and took the bronze medal two years ago. She became the first skier, male or female, to win six medals in one discipline at world championships.
"It's been a complete world championships, every emotion I could feel," Shiffrin said. "I'm really proud when I look back at the last two weeks. And I also have things to learn as well ... how I handle situations in life and how I can improve on that."
St-Germain was third after the opening run, 0.61 behind Shiffrin. Swiss skier Wendy Holdener, who was second going into the final run, straddled a gate and did not finish.
"I was really not expecting this, obviously. It's unbelievable," St-Germain said. "I attacked, had a bit of a mistake, just thinking go down, go down, go down, and it worked out, I guess."
St-Germain's previous best result at major championships was sixth in the slalom at the 2019 worlds. Sixth is also her best finish in a World Cup slalom, in Levi, Finland, in 2020.
Saturday's race was the final women's event of the worlds. The championships close with the men's slalom Sunday.
Shiffrin's performance was a vast improvement on how she fared at last year's Beijing Olympics, where she didn't win a medal amid enormous expectations and didn't finish three of her five races.
"We all know that I've experienced the situation where I have no medals," Shiffrin said. "So I'm very, very appreciative to be on the silver side of things. Even if it's not gold, it's still been such a spectacular world championships and a spectacular season."
The slalom -- traditionally Shiffrin's best event -- was a tale of two vastly different runs.
Starting first in the opening leg, Shiffrin darted down between the blue and red gates with her usual world-beating precision, rapidly changing the direction of her fluorescent orange skis on the bright snow almost to perfection. But in the second run, Shiffrin lost almost her entire advantage over St-Germain by the first checkpoint, holding on to a slim lead in the middle section before eventually falling behind in the deep ruts at the bottom of the course, which went back and forth between shade and sun.
At the finish, Shiffrin didn't seem to know what her result was at first, then seemed unperturbed when she realized that St-Germain beat her.
"It's, for sure, fatigue," Shiffrin said. "It's been difficult just to keep the focus going. The second run, the course set was also completely different and more speed in it, and when the agility is a little missing because the energy is a little bit missing, then I'm not willing to take on this speed and to risk everything.''
The course for the first run was set by Mark Mitter, Shiffrin's assistant coach. While Day was listed as the course setter on the race start list, it was Mitter who actually performed the duties.
"It's a joy to work with a superstar like her," Mitter said. "It's just trying not to get into her way, actually. ... We work together as a team."
In her career at worlds, Shiffrin improved her remarkable record to 14 medals in 17 races. She has some time off before resuming her chase of Ingemar Stenmark's record of 86 World Cup wins next month, needing only one more victory.
Shiffrin will skip next weekend's World Cup races in Crans Montana, Switzerland, and instead head to Norway for some training ahead of races in Kvitfjell on March 3-5 followed by her favored technical races in Sweden -- Stenmark's home nation -- the following weekend.
Then the season ends in mid-March with the World Cup finals in Soldeu, Andorra.
"I know I'm close to [Stenmark's] record, but I think it's important for everybody to remember that it might not happen this season," Shiffrin said. "So I don't take for granted all the success I've had so far this season, even this world championships.
"Now, first, we celebrate the last two weeks tonight, and then we reset, recover and get ready for the final races of the season."