From Lindsey Vonn’s very first inklings that, just maybe, she might attempt this unlikeliest of comebacks, it was always for this moment.
She wanted to stand atop the Olympia delle Tofane downhill – her favorite piste in the world – and feel that rush one more time. The speed, beckoning. The reckless tilt of the slope. The chatter of her skis beneath her. The gold, waiting.
For 13 seconds, the world held its breath with her, hoping.
Why We Wrote This
Most people can’t imagine what it feels like to speed down a mountain at 85 mph, but many can relate to overcoming adversity. Lindsey Vonn, one of the greatest speed skiers of all time, showed Olympic determination in her unlikely comeback.
The crash that engulfed her at the first treacherous turn will be devastating to more than the body that has been through so much throughout her career. “I hope I can close this chapter better than I did in ’19,” when she first retired, she said during a media event in October.
Instead, the closing image of this chapter will be of her hanging like a teardrop in front of the impassive wall of the Dolomites, a helicopter airlifting her to safety.
Vonn could have turned back many times. She might never have attempted such an audacious return with the goal of skiing in the Olympics at 41. She might have admitted defeat when she injured her knee last week. She could have backed off coming into that first turn.
But then she would not have been Lindsey Vonn, and the world would never have seen the greatest speed skier of all time.
In those few seconds in Cortina on Sunday, Vonn gave the world what she always did: absolutely everything. And never in a remarkable career that included an Olympic gold, 84 World Cup wins, and numerous injury airlifts was the heart or the cost of that consuming fire more apparent.
That is not a medal or a fairytale ending but, in a way, something more. It was a wrenching portrait of sacrifice and passion broadcast as the world was watching, a reminder of why the Olympics so often kindle something greater than sport.
“A lot of people can’t relate to ski racing,” she added at the October media event. “But they can relate to adversity.”
Every woman who put skis to snow Sunday in Cortina would understand that. Breezy Johnson, most of all. It was here, four years ago, that Johnson crashed so violently that she had to pull out of the 2022 Winter Olympics weeks later. Today, on that same slope, the American was the fastest down the mountain.
It was a run that underlined the thin blade between glory and madness. Both Johnson and her closest competitor, German Emma Aicher, pushed their runs to the brink of disaster, demanding time from a slope stubbornly unwilling to yield. It got a bit “squirrelly” off some of the jumps, Johnson said after the race with a downhiller’s understatement. She goes home with gold.
But she said her heart went out to her teammate. “I know how sometimes, because you love this course so much, when you crash on it and it hurts you like that, it hurts so much worse.”
Just over a week ago, the last chapter of Vonn’s story here looked to be so different. This was to be her moment to set things right.
She had retired in 2019, not because the flame had grown dim, but rather because the body had grown weary.
With time, however, as her injuries mended and she began to feel better, she found, somewhat to her own surprise, that the fire was not dimming. Her body was feeling as good as it ever had, and the Olympics were coming – in Cortina.
“The whole time I was contemplating my comeback, Cortina was always there, my goal,” she said in October. “I don’t think I would have tried this comeback if the Olympics had been anywhere else. Cortina always keeps bringing me back, and it’s calling me back one more time.”
What happened next defied belief.
She returned this season at age 41 – and utterly dominated. Before her fall in Switzerland on Jan. 30, Vonn had won two of the five downhill races and never finished lower than third. She was leading the World Cup downhill standings by 144 points.
This wasn’t a comeback, it was something unlike anything the sport had ever seen. Had she medaled here, she would have been the oldest alpine skier ever to medal – by six years. It looked not only possible, but likely.
Then came the crash just over a week ago. Should Vonn have raced here? Many will question her decision. But the head of the International Ski Federation, Johan Eliasch, gave perhaps the most fitting answer.
“Well then, they don’t know Lindsey. That’s all I can say.”
Here in Cortina, Vonn has been adamant. “I will try, as long as I have the ability to. I will not go home regretting not trying. I will do everything in my power to be in that starting gate.”
To most people, this might have seemed reckless. But it was Lindsey.
“I’ve never been afraid. I’ve always been the adventurer. I’ve always been the kid that climbs the tree,” she said this week.
This is the stuff of Winter Olympians. Fear is for those who stay in the ski lodge. But what truly took Vonn back into the start gate – in the face of such enormous challenges – seems to be a yearning she could not quite let go.
“Life without ski racing is pretty boring, to be honest,” Vonn told the BBC in 2024. “It’s been five years [since retirement], and I’ve realized that there’s nothing that’s going to fill the hole of ski racing. I’m never going to go 85 miles an hour again.”
In 2024, as part of a promotion for Red Bull, she was able to ski the most feared downhill in the world – the Streif course in Kitzbühel, Austria, a race only open to men. “I was so happy,” she told the BBC. “It made me so happy to my core. And then I got done with it and was like, ‘OK, I’m back to not doing this anymore,’ and it was one of the worst things for me, because I got a sprinkle of what I used to have – and I don’t have that anymore.”
For three months, Vonn had a sprinkle – a glorious sprinkle that sent the sport into supernova. And then after her fall last week, the call of Cortina was stronger than fear of the injury.
On arriving, she reflected: “It’s an amazing feeling, and one I know I will never have again, because I’ve been retired, and I know I’m lucky that I even get this chance one more time. And every time I stand in the starting gate, I realize I’m lucky to be able to do something I love so much, and I don’t take that for granted.”
Vonn has long said that her favorite word is “grit.” Today, the world will be in no doubt of what that looks like.