CORTINA D\u2019AMPEZZO
\nLindsey Vonn\u2019s dream of Olympic medal glory is alive after the American ski star again defied a serious knee injury to successfully complete her second training run for the Milan-Cortina women\u2019s downhill on Saturday.
\nA ruptured anterior cruciate ligament in her left knee did not stop Vonn from clocking a third-best time of 1min 38.28sec in a confident run down the Olimpia delle Tofane piste, which will host the women\u2019s alpine skiing starting with the downhill final on Sunday.
\nAfter her run, Vonn swept past journalists in the mixed zone, replying \u201cgood\u201d when asked how it went in a session which was eventually stopped due to poor weather conditions after being paused for well over an hour.
\nHer coach Aksel Lund Svindal and teammate Breezy Johnson, who was 0.37sec ahead of Vonn in the lead when the session was paused with 21 athletes having completed their run, said that their hearts stopped when Vonn\u2019s knee nearly buckled on an early jump.
\n\u201cI think everyone gasped a little bit, you know that\u2019s how it goes,\u201d said Johnson, who tried and failed to race the same piste with a torn ACL in 2022.
\n\u201cI\u2019m glad she\u2019s down safe.\u201d
\nThe 41-year-old Vonn — Olympic downhill champion in 2010 — would have been among those tipped for gold in her favoured discipline had she not suffered the serious injury a week before the official start of the 2026 Winter Games.
\nVonn\u2019s presence at these Olympics was already a huge achievement before her injury as she roared back from retirement in November 2024 to re-establish herself as the premier woman downhill skier despite being in her early 40s.
\n\u2018Push harder\u2019
\nHer rivals and Svindal, himself a two-time Olympic gold winner, have lauded Vonn\u2019s iron will which is allowing her to not just compete but aim for a fourth medal at the Winter Games with an injury that would have ruled out most athletes.
\n\u201cShe knows that she\u2019ll have to push harder tomorrow because the rest of the girls will and it\u2019s the Olympic downhill, you\u2019re not going to get away with a medal here unless you push hard and I think she\u2019s ready for it,\u201d said Svindal.
\nA brace is helping to stabilise Vonn\u2019s left knee which also suffered bone bruising — she claimed the meniscus damage could have already been there — during a heavy crash in the last World Cup downhill race in Switzerland before the world\u2019s top women alpine skiers decamped to Cortina.
\n\u201cThat\u2019s obviously not an advantage,\u201d said Svindal of the brace.
\n\u201cWe\u2019re not focusing on that because if she starts to ask to take the brace away, I think there\u2019s a couple of doctors that would like, have something to say about that.\u201d
\nLocal favourite Sofia Goggia, who won gold and silver in the downhill at the last two Olympics, had a bumpy run but managed to recover.
\nGoggia would have had a late night as she lit the cauldron in the opening ceremony in Cortina on Friday, one of two that will burn throughout these Games.
\nGermany\u2019s rising star Emma Aicher, who at 22 years old has blossomed into a leading medal contender at these Games, timed 1:38.75.
\nThis time last year all-rounder Aicher had never claimed a World Cup podium, but she has since taken eight in three disciplines — downhill, super-G and slalom.
\nGiant slalom world champion Federica Brignone, on the comeback trail after a double leg break in April, told reporters she had yet to decide whether she would compete on Sunday after finishing nearly a second behind Johnson.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
CORTINA D\u2019AMPEZZO Lindsey Vonn\u2019s dream of Olympic medal glory is alive after the American ski star again defied a serious knee injury to successfully complete her second training run for the Milan-Cortina women\u2019s downhill on Saturday. A ruptured anterior cruciate ligament in her left knee did not stop Vonn from clocking a third-best time of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-530165","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-sports"],"yoast_head":"\n