Lindsey Vonn is ready to race.
A month after announcing she was coming out of retirement, Vonn said Friday that she’ll return to the World Cup circuit next week in St. Moritz, Switzerland. The super-G races will be her first since February 2019, when the toll of several injuries forced her to retire.
But Vonn had a partial knee replacement last April and felt so good afterward that it got her thinking about returning to ski racing.
“The last years of my career were a lot more challenging than I let on, than anyone really understood. But I feel stronger now than I did in my mid- to late-20s,” Vonn, who turned 40 in October, said in a news conference ahead of the first women’s World Cup race at Birds of Prey in Beaver Creek, Colorado.
“The passion for skiing has never gone away, I just wasn’t physically able to do it anymore,” Vonn added. “Now that I have the chance to do what I love, why would I not try? Life is short. You’ve got to live every day to the maximum, and that’s all I’m doing.”
Here’s what you need to know about Vonn’s return to elite ski racing:
Next weekend!
Vonn will ski the super-G races in St. Moritz, a place where she’s won five times and finished on the podium another five times. Her last win there was in a super-G in 2015.
“It’s a perfect place to start because I know that hill very well. I love it,” Vonn said. “And it’s nice to start with super-G, as well, just to kind of dip my foot in, see how it goes.”
The first race is Saturday, followed by a second super-G on Sunday.
She’d hoped to, but no.
Even Vonn, who has won more World Cup races than anyone besides Mikaela Shiffrin and Ingemar Stenmark, can’t just show up at the starting gate. She had to get enough points to qualify for World Cup races, which she did last week with four races at Copper Mountain. She also had to re-enter the anti-doping pool.
By the time she got all that done, it was just too quick of a turnaround to be ready to race this weekend.
“I couldn’t physically make it possible,” Vonn said.
Instead, Vonn will serve as a forerunner, a person who skis the course before a race so the first skiers don’t have an advantage over the rest of the field.
Because she can. And because she loves ski racing.
Vonn is one of the greatest ski racers ever. In addition to her 82 World Cup victories, she won four overall World Cup titles and the downhill at the Vancouver Olympics in 2010. While the speed events were her specialty, she also won World Cup races in slalom, giant slalom and combined.
But Vonn badly injured her right knee in a crash in February 2013 — she tore her ACL and MCL and also had a tibial plateau fracture — and missed the Sochi Olympics in 2014 after re-injuring it in December of that year. She was injured “pretty much” every season after that until she retired.
“I kept going through all the injuries because I love ski racing. And no injury ever held me back until it finally broke me,” Vonn said.
Vonn said she thought long and hard before having knee replacement surgery, and did extensive research before deciding to go ahead with it. Simply being pain-free was the goal, but when she was able to do things she hadn’t in years, she naturally wondered if racing was possible.
Vonn said she wasn’t concerned about her age, and took inspiration from Simone Biles’ comeback. Biles won her second Olympic all-around title in Paris at 27, an age once considered ancient for a gymnast.
“I’m not the first person to do it. I’m just maybe the first woman to do it in ski racing,” Vonn said. “I think Simone Biles is a perfect example of what can be done at an older age. And she’s not even old! It’s just — it’s outside the confines of what we believe is the right age for the sport.
“I don’t think I’m reinventing the wheel,” Vonn added. “I’m just doing what I feel is right for me but, at the same time, continuing on what other women have done before me.”
What do you think?
Vonn is, again, one of the greatest ski racers ever. If she’s coming back, she’s coming back to win.
“Success is not just participating,” she said. “While I am very excited to be participating, I definitely have goals and expectations and I’m trying to be as patient as possible with myself on this journey and take it step by step and not skip any steps.
“I know my way back to a competitive level might take a race or two, but I certainly intend on getting back to where I was before.”
