{"id":456353,"date":"2026-02-08T12:29:09","date_gmt":"2026-02-08T12:29:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/456353\/"},"modified":"2026-02-08T12:29:09","modified_gmt":"2026-02-08T12:29:09","slug":"lindsey-vonn-crashes-in-olympic-womens-downhill-airlifted-off-course","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/456353\/","title":{"rendered":"Lindsey Vonn crashes in Olympic women\u2019s downhill, airlifted off course"},"content":{"rendered":"

CORTINA D\u2019AMPEZZO, Italy \u2014 Lindsey Vonn said she would make it to the Olympic downhill starting gate despite rupturing the most important ligament in her knee nine days ago, and she did.<\/p>\n

But Vonn\u2019s dream of reclaiming the downhill gold medal Sunday ended in disappointment, as the American Alpine skiing legend crashed on the famed Olympia delle Tofane slope at the Winter Olympics.<\/p>\n

Starting 13th, Vonn went off a jump and clipped a gate in midair, sending her sideways as she landed and crashed hard to the snow.<\/p>\n

It was all done in 13 seconds. Within minutes, a helicopter could be heard flying up the mountain as medics tended to Vonn in the middle of the slope. The helicopter airlifted her out and flew over the finish area to a loud ovation. The race was paused for about 20 minutes.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat definitely was the last thing we wanted to see,\u201d Vonn\u2019s sister, Karin Kildow, said on the NBC broadcast after Vonn was airlifted out. \u201cIt happened quick. When that happens, you\u2019re just immediately hoping she\u2019s OK. It was scary because when you start seeing the stretchers being put out, it\u2019s not a good sign.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe put it all out there, so it\u2019s really hard to see.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kildow said the family hoped for an update on Vonn\u2019s status soon.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe has all of her surgeons and her (physical therapy) staff here and her doctors, so I\u2019m sure they\u2019ll give us a report,\u201d Kildow said. \u201cI think she\u2019s being evaluated right now is the only thing we\u2019ve heard.\u201d<\/p>\n

U.S. teammate Breezy Johnson won the race<\/a>, becoming the first American since Vonn in 2010 to win Olympic gold in the downhill.<\/p>\n

\"Lindsey<\/p>\n

\n A helicopter arrives to airlift Lindsey Vonn off the mountain in Cortina d\u2019Ampezzo after Sunday\u2019s crash in the Olympic women\u2019s downhill. (Mattia Ozbot \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n

For more than two decades, no one skied harder, more aggressively or more fearlessly than Vonn. It was her superpower. It turned her into the greatest speed skier in the sport\u2019s history, but it also led to a series of career-altering crashes that ultimately ended her career six years ago.<\/p>\n

Even making it to the starting gate was an astounding result given that it came a little over a week after Vonn ruptured the anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) in her left knee<\/a> in one of her final races before the Olympics. The injury appeared to dash Vonn\u2019s hopes of becoming the oldest person to win an Olympic medal in Alpine before reaching Cortina.<\/p>\n

But with a combination of determination, strength and guts, Vonn manifested enough health and stability for her left knee to try, brushing off an injury that sidelines most athletes for the better part of a year. Vonn is not \u201cmost athletes.\u201d At 41, she is an irrepressible force obsessed with speed and skiing who loves nothing more than flying down a steep sheet of ice at 80 mph on the edge of recklessness and sanity, where all great downhill skiers thrive.<\/p>\n

The crash brought a heartbreaking end to one of the great early dramas<\/a> of the first days of these Winter Games and added another sheen of luster to Vonn\u2019s record-breaking career. She\u2019s won 84 World Cup races \u2014 including two downhills this season \u2014 along with eight world championship and three Olympic medals. Only Mikaela Shiffrin (108) and Sweden\u2019s Ingemar Stenmark (86) have won more World Cup races.<\/p>\n

\"Lindsey<\/p>\n

\n Vonn is airlifted off the mountain. (Jacquelyn Martin \/ AP)<\/p>\n

It\u2019s unclear if Vonn suffered further damage to the knee. She was originally scheduled to race the downhill, team combined and super-G at these Olympics. The latter two are still to come.<\/p>\n

For more than a week, Vonn had seemed superhuman. She completed two training runs in decent form, especially the second one Saturday.<\/p>\n

When it was over, her coach, Aksel Lund Svindal, said the only cause for concern was that she was landing on one ski rather than two. She seemingly favored her right knee, the one that had undergone successful partial knee replacement surgery in 2024, allowing her to make her comeback. Svindal said she could land on two skis, but her brain seemed to be subconsciously leading her to favor her right one.<\/p>\n

Vonn didn\u2019t talk to the media after those runs. Svindal spoke for her, and he was optimistic.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think you\u2019re going to be speaking with someone else tomorrow,\u201d he said Saturday.<\/p>\n

Instead, Vonn was carried off a mountain in a helicopter for the second time in nine days.<\/p>\n

This is a developing story and will be updated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CORTINA D\u2019AMPEZZO, Italy \u2014 Lindsey Vonn said she would make it to the Olympic downhill starting gate despite…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":456354,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[4,450,12663,451,3,1082,452,453],"class_list":{"0":"post-456353","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-breaking-news","8":"tag-breaking-news","9":"tag-breakingnews","10":"tag-global-sports","11":"tag-headlines","12":"tag-news","13":"tag-olympics","14":"tag-top-stories","15":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/456353","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=456353"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/456353\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/456354"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=456353"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=456353"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=456353"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}