For Lindsey Vonn, this might be it.
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The 2018 Winter Games may not have gone the way Lindsey Vonn anticipated, but she got something invaluable out of going to Pyeongchang: a proper resting place for her deceased grandfather Don Kildow, a Korean War veteran that Vonn dedicated her performance in these Games to.
She will now focus her energy on Thursday’s combined, which adds the times of a downhill and one run of slalom, her specialist discipline.
She’d said she’d turn down a trip to the White House if she won Olympic gold. After tearing ligaments in her right knee and fracturing her tibia at the World Championships, she reinjured the same joint and partially tore her ACL right before the 2014 Olympics.
“I skied a great race today”, Vonn also said. I gave my all. I thought I executed the line really well.
Maybe, but on this brilliantly sunny day on the slopes at Jeongseon Alpine Centre that seemed OK to Vonn, too. “I have no regrets”. I kept working hard. “My family is proud of me and I’m proud of myself”.
Schedule changes led her to pull out of Wednesday’s downhill race, where she would have had a shot at the podium, so she could be rested for the combined. The silver medal went to 22-year-old teammate Mikaela Shiffrin.
Vonn, who won a bronze medal in her preferred downhill earlier this week, says this is her last Olympics. “I used to win slaloms, but now my body doesn’t cooperate with me as much as I would like”.
Although Austria’s Anna Veith, the super-G silver-medal victor, has decided not to compete in the downhill, the Austrians always have a challenger with Cornelia Huetter’s win at Lake Louise, in Canada, on the World Cup circuit in December, a warning that she could be an outside threat, as could Switzerland’s Michelle Gisin. But that’s likely not her reality. “But I’m on the podium, so I’m very happy”. I gave it everything I had.
“I take a lot of great memories with me”. Mowinckel, whose best-ever in World Cup race is sixth, finished 0.09 of a second behind Goggia and Vonn was 0.47 behind.
Chalk it up to rust.
Vonn, who won downhill gold and super-G bronze in the 2010 Vancouver Games but missed Sochi through injury, said she could not have asked for any more than her impeccable descent in bright, cold conditions. Still, many MAGA trolls delighted in Lindsey’s misfortune.
“I’m really happy it was enough for third place and now to celebrate with Michelle, it’s insane”, said Holdener, who also captured a silver in the slalom at the Pyeongchang Games.
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With the silver, Shiffrin became the fourth American to win at least three Olympic Alpine ski medals. “They want to defeat you”.
