Mancuso (Olympic Valley, Calif.), the reigning Olympic giant slalom champion, set records and collected podium results at an impressive pace in January by capturing a historic five straight FIS World Cup top-three finishes (two of which were wins). Mancuso is the first U.S. alpine skier to record five consecutive top-three finishes, bettering a mark that had stood since 1983.

USA 1 won gold at the four-man World Cup race in Cortina, Italy, Jan. 13. Driven by Holcomb (Park, City, Utah) and pushed by Jovanovic (Tom’s River, N.J.), Mesler (Calgary, Alberta), and Kreitzburg (Akron, Ohio), the team had the first and third best starts with push times of 4.82 and 4.83. The team won a consecutive gold medal in the four-man competition Jan. 21, at the World Cup race in Igls, Austria, dominating the competition with two first-place runs. USA 1 had the two fastest pushes of the competition with 5.04 and 5.02 start times.

Second place for the female vote was a tie between Serena Williams (Palm Beach Gardens, Fla.) of tennis, and Noelle Pikus-Pace (Orem, Utah) of skeleton.

Williams won her eighth career Grand Slam singles title at the Australian Open in Melbourne, Australia. Unseeded and ranked No. 81 in the world, Williams defeated six seeded players, including two ranked in the Top 10 in the world. In the final, Williams dominated Maria Shaparova, the tournament’s top seed. It was her first title since winning the 2005 Australian Open.

Pikus-Pace, the 2005 World Cup Champion, dominated the competition with the four fastest runs and a new track record to claim the women’s skeleton World Championships title in St. Moritz, Switzerland on Jan. 26. Pikus-Pace won by the largest margin in women’s skeleton World Championship history with a 1.56 second lead.

Figure skater Kimmie Meissner (Bel Air, Md.) took third place in the female vote. Meissner won her first U.S. title by beating a talented pool of senior ladies at the 2007 State Farm U.S. Figure Skating Championships. She earned her personal best U.S. total with a score of 181.68. She was the only U.S. lady to land a triple-triple combination in both her short program and free skate. She landed a total of six triple jumps in her free skate and set the all-time U.S. record for a ladies short program with a score of 65.59. She also qualified for the World Championships for the third year in a row.

Second place for the men went to figure skater Evan Lysacek (Los Angeles, Calif.). Lysacek won his first U.S. title at the 2007 State Farm U.S. Figure Skating Championships. He cleanly landed his first quad toe-triple toe combination jump, which received all positive marks from the judges. He beat the second-place finisher by more than 30 points. His total score of 248.88 set the all-time U.S. record. Lysacek skated a flawless free skate with eight triple jumps, in addition to the quad triple, and it was considered one of the best free skates in the history of the U.S. Championships. He also qualified for the World Championships for the third year in a row.

Skeleton athlete Eric Bernotas (Avondale, Pa.) was third in the male voting. Bernotas broke the track record during his first run of the World Cup men’s skeleton race in Nagano, Japan, to claim his third-career World Cup victory on Jan. 13. Bernotas won the silver medal after the final heats of men’s skeleton World Championships in St. Moritz Switzerland on Jan. 27.

The Winter World University Games Team curlers, skipped by John Shuster took home second-place honors for the team award. Shuster’s team won the U.S. delegation’s only gold medal defeating Great Britain, 0-4, in the gold-medal game in Pinerolo, Italy. Shuster’s team finished with a 9-2 record, defeating Canada in the semifinals to advance to the gold-medal game. Shuster (Chisholm, Minn.) teamed up with Jeff Isaacson (Gilbert, Minn.), Chris Plys (Duluth, Minn.), Shane McKinlay (Hibbing, Minn.) and Kevin Johnson (Mapleton, Minn.).

In a tie for third place was Bob and Mike Bryan with tennis and Brooke Castile and Ben Okolski with figure skating.

The Bryan brothers (Camarillo, Calif.) teamed together to successfully defend the men’s doubles title at the Australian Open in Melbourne, Australia. The No. 1 doubles team in the world defeated No. 2 Jonas Bjorkman and Max Mirnyi and the No. 3 team in the world. It was their fifth Grand Slam men’s doubles title. Together the Bryan’s went 6-1 in doubles play in January.

Castile (Gross Pointe Woods, Mich.) and Okolski (Ann Arbor, Mich.) won their first U.S. title at the 2007 State Farm U.S. Figure Skating Championships, in Spokane, Wash. After finishing eighth in 2006 they beat the reigning two-time champions. They were the only top U.S. pairs team to implement the triple twist element into both their free skate and short program. They jumped from third place after the short program to first overall. They set a U.S. personal best with their score of 178.40, bettering their previous best by more than 33 points. Their win earned both of them a spot on the U.S. world team.