By ANDREW DAMPF
They said she “should see a psychologist,” had “gone completely mad” and hadn’t “recognized the meaning and purpose of her other life” away from skiing.
Well, Lindsey Vonn’s return to downhill racing on her titanium knee doesn’t seem so crazy now.
Not after she dominated the opening speed weekend of the Olympic season, won the first downhill by a huge margin and gained more points than any other skier over three days of World Cup racing.
At age 41.
“All the people that didn’t believe in me, I have to thank them because it really gives me a lot of motivation,” Vonn said.
“I’m surprised that people haven’t figured that out by now. That every time you talk bad about me it just makes me stronger and better and more motivated. So I would love for people to keep coming at me. It would be great. Motivate me even more.”
A year ago, when Vonn was preparing to race again after nearly six years of retirement, two-time Olympic champion Michaela Dorfmeister suggested the American “should see a psychologist,” adding on Austrian TV, “Does she want to kill herself?”
Austrian downhill great Franz Klammer said “she’s gone completely mad” and four-time overall World Cup champion Pirmin Zurbriggen added that Vonn “hasn’t recognized the meaning and purpose of her other life in recent years.”
After all, the risks are high in a sport where skiers hurl themselves down icy mountains at speeds of 130 kph (80 mph) with little protection besides a helmet, a back protector and a safety air bag system under their suits.
But Vonn looked more composed and stable than skiers half her age on the Corviglia course in St. Moritz, Switzerland.
LeBron James shares solidarity with Vonn
When Vonn won Friday’s downhill by 0.98 seconds — an eternity in a sport often decided by mere hundredths — she was emboldened enough to shape her hands in a sleeping gesture in the style of NBA star Stephen Curry’s “Night, night” gesture.
In other words, she felt she had just put the rest of the field to rest when she became the oldest winner in World Cup history — among men and women.
The performance and gesture got some attention in the NBA.
“40+ is the new 20. Well, until you wake up the next day!” 40-year-old Los Angeles Lakers star LeBron James said on Instagram.
Goggia’s pacifier
Fellow downhiller Sofia Goggia, the 2018 Olympic champion, said on Friday that Vonn “took us all to school and left us with a pacifier (baby’s dummy) in our mouths.”
The next day, Goggia backed up her comments and put a pacifier in her mouth while standing next to Vonn.
Vonn also finished second in another downhill on Saturday despite a big mistake midway down, then placed fourth in a super-G on Sunday. In all, she earned a weekend-best 230 World Cup points — 60 more than Goggia and 85 more than Emma Aicher, the 22-year-old German who won Saturday’s race.
She “raised the bar for every athlete in downhill and super-G,” Goggia said.
Pushing back retirement
Vonn’s performance has her reconsidering her plans.
Instead of going back into retirement immediately after the Milan Cortina Winter Games in February, she’ll likely ski on through the end of the World Cup season in March.
“I think I might need to change my approach,” she said.
Vonn’s head coach Chris Knight said: “We can start planning for the whole season.”
Having figured out her equipment and with improved fitness from last season — she added 12 pounds (5.5 kilograms) of muscle to her frame — Knight believes Vonn can perform at this level every weekend.
“It’s just about managing the load, the training and the recovery time,” Knight told The Associated Press. “It’s almost recovery is more important right now because she’s in a really good place with the skiing.”
Dream team with Shiffrin
Women’s Alpine skiing at the Olympics will be held in Cortina d’Ampezzo, where Vonn holds the record with 12 World Cup wins.
Besides downhill and super-G on her Olympic program, Vonn also plans to enter the new team combined — which features two-person teams with one competitor racing a downhill run and another performing a slalom run.
Vonn campaigned to pair with slalom standout Mikaela Shiffrin at last year’s world championships but her performances then didn’t merit that chance. Shiffrin won gold with Breezy Johnson instead.
But the way this season has started for Vonn — and with Shiffrin having won all three slaloms — could result in a skiing “Dream Team” in Cortina.
“If they do it like they did last year at the world champs, you take the fastest downhiller and the fastest slalom skier and move down from there,” Knight said.
Svindal’s calming influence
Vonn also has former Olympic downhill champion Aksel Lund Svindal on her coaching staff this season — and it was the Norwegian offering the final words of advice before she raced over the weekend.
“He’s been at the start a million times and his calm energy is really helpful to me because sometimes I’m really intense,” Vonn said. “He’s just always so stable and that gives me peace of mind.”
Andrew Dampf is at https://x.com/AndrewDampf
AP Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/milan-cortina-2026-winter-olympics
