Lindsey Vonn Gets Emotional After Taking Bronze in Downhill

Bronze medallist Lindsey Vonn celebrates during the victory ceremony for the Ladies’ Downhill at the PyeongChang 2018 Winter Olympic Games. How does she deal with the expectations? But for Vonn, it was another heart-breaking performance after finishing sixth in the Super G on Saturday.

Vonn had also helped inspire Goggia when she was a teenager watching the 2010 Winter Games, the Italian recalled as she battled to digest her new status as an Olympic champion.

Maybe, but on this brilliantly sunny day on the slopes at Jeongseon Alpine Centre that seemed OK to Vonn, too. She placed well in her training runs and positioned herself within reach of the podium for the final. Vonn has three Olympic medals, and 81 World Cup wins which are the most of any female racer in the sport’s history.

Sergey Ridzik, representing the Olympic Athlete from Russian Federation, ended up with the bronze medal, despite colliding with Canada’s Kevin Drury. But the moment was golden. It is a figurative passing of the torch, with Vonn in her last Olympics and Shiffrin poised to become the face of the US ski team. Her No. 1 rival – in her mind, and in the mind of many observers – is Italy’s Sofia Goggia. “I wish I could keep going, I’m having so much fun and I love what I do, but my body just can’t take another four years”. It’s sad! This is my last downhill.

“She has 140 podiums. Me?”

The American wasn’t at Sochi in 2014, instead “on the couch, watching”, she said, after two operations to fix torn ligaments in her right knee.

“It was not about the medal, it was about my downhill”.

Vonn fought back tears afterward trying to describe it all. The most tear-jerking part of Vonn’s interview came when she confessed it’s probably time to take a bow.

Vonn made few errors in her descent, but it was just not enough, Mowinckel providing a surprise factor with her second place after starting 19. “I couldn’t have done it much better than this, this was my best downhill ever”. “I wish this wasn’t my last Olympics, but it is”.

“It’s hard for me to understand the thought process of the savage abuse I’ve taken on the internet”.

“I hope this latest comeback sticks”.

US women’s ski team speed coach Chip White said he was upbeat following Wednesday’s race. But a couple of early turns swallowed that sliver of time, and Vonn couldn’t get it back. “You’ve seen me more excited after a third-place World Cup finish”. “And this hill, it suits me really well for downhill”. But it’s all made me who I am.

Vonn has undergone two serious knee operations and it was just before the second surgery in 2014 that she adopted her first dog, Leo, from an animal shelter.

Moving, as she put it, like a “samurai”, the Italian beat Norway’s Ragnhild Mowinckel and American Lindsey Vonn in a winning time of 1 minute 39.22 seconds. That leaves them both in good position to come up with gold heading into the free skate Friday.

“They want to defeat you”, she said. I radioed up to the top to try and let the coaches know to slip that out.

There’s an outside chance she’s not done, though the bookies in Las Vegas would be wise not to lay down a line. She will compete in the combined, along with American teammate Mikaela Shiffrin, and that will be her last race in Pyeongchang.

“It’s a longshot”, she said.

“I wanted to win for my grandfather but I didn’t”.

“It was an unbelievable day that I will never forget”.