Lindsey Vonn says she’s going to make her Olympic comeback on the 2026 Milan Cortina Video games regardless of struggling a torn ACL.
The 41-year-old American made the announcement at a press convention from Cortina, Italy, on Tuesday.
“This isn’t, clearly, what I had hoped for,” Vonn mentioned. “I have been working actually onerous to come back into these Video games in a a lot totally different place. I do know what my possibilities had been earlier than the crash, and I do know my possibilities aren’t the identical because it stands at the moment, however I do know there’s nonetheless an opportunity, and so long as there’s an opportunity, I’ll attempt.”
Vonn crashed in a World Cup race in Crans-Montana on Friday, dropping management and ending up tangled within the security nets on the higher portion of the course. She obtained medical consideration for about 5 minutes and was airlifted from the course in a helicopter.
Along with fully rupturing her ACL, Vonn mentioned she has bone bruising “plus meniscal injury” in her left leg. After days of bodily remedy, she skied with a brace on Tuesday and is getting ready to compete within the Olympics.
“It feels steady, it feels sturdy,” she mentioned.
“I’ll do the whole lot in my energy to be within the beginning gate.”
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Vonn has gained three Olympic medals, together with a gold medal within the ladies’s downhill occasion on the 2010 Vancouver Video games. She most just lately competed on the Olympic stage in 2018, incomes downhill bronze in PyeongChang.
Vonn retired in February 2019 as essentially the most embellished feminine alpine skier in historical past and introduced her return to the game practically six years later. She was ranked first in ladies’s downhill getting into her newest race in Switzerland and in place to be a medal contender as soon as once more in Milan Cortina.
“I’m not letting this slip by way of my fingers,” she mentioned. “I’m not crying. My head is excessive, I’m standing tall and I’m going to do my finest and regardless of the result’s.”
Vonn’s Olympic slate is about to start on Sunday, two days after the Opening Ceremony, with the ladies’s downhill. Coaching periods for the ladies’s downhill are set for Thursday, Friday and Saturday earlier than Sunday’s medal occasion.
She was additionally planning to compete in super-G and the brand new staff mixed occasion.
