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The skier Lindsey Vonn, whose comeback at age 41 has been one of the most remarkable stories of this year's ski season, crashed and injured her knee in a race in Switzerland on Friday, putting her goal of another Olympic medal in jeopardy.
Vonn was the third racer to crash in the downhill race at Crans-Montana, the final stop on the World Cup circuit before the Winter Olympics are set to begin next month.
Vonn lost control after landing a jump, and she skidded down the hill into the sideline nets. She was able to ski slowly down to the finish line by herself, at times seen holding her left knee. Afterward, she was airlifted off the course, and the race was called off.
Her condition was unclear immediately following the crash Friday. In a brief statement, the U.S. ski team said only that Vonn was "being evaluated."
In a post on Instagram, Vonn said she injured her left knee and is "discussing the situation with my doctors and team and will continue to undergo further exams."
"My Olympic dream is not over," she said. "[I]f there's one thing I know how to do, it's a comeback."
Vonn was one of Team USA's biggest stars in the 2000s and 2010s. Her Olympic gold in the downhill race in the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver was the first for an American woman in that event. When she retired in 2019, her 82 World Cup wins were the most of any skier ever.
But her retirement had never sat well with her. She was forced into it, she felt, by repeated injuries to her knees. A partial knee replacement changed things, she said. She began training again in earnest in 2024, with her eyes set on the Olympic opportunity ahead in 2026 at Cortina D'Ampezzo in Italy — a widely-loved ski course where she had her first podium finish in 2004 and broke the record for most World Cup wins in 2015.
"It's not a secret that my goal is the Olympics," she told reporters last fall.
This season, her success on the World Cup circuit has been nothing short of astonishing. She won her first race of the season — the downhill in St. Moritz, Switzerland, in December — and has since won another and finished on the podium in five other races.
The Olympic opening ceremony is next Friday, Feb. 6. The women's downhill race is just two days later on Sunday, Feb. 8.
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