LINDSEY VONN SUFFERS COMPLEX LEG BREAK IN OLYMPIC CRASH

## The Impossible Dream Dies in 13 Seconds Lindsey Vonn's pursuit of an against-all-odds Olympic medal ended Sunday with a broken left leg following a devastating crash only 13.4 seconds into the downhill final. The sound you heard wasn't applause. It was silence. By her own adamant admission, Vonn was preparing to race with "zero per cent" of her anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) intact. On January 30, 2026, during the final World Cup tune-up in Crans-Montana, Switzerland, Vonn suffered a high-speed crash into the safety netting. Nine days later, she pushed out of the Olympic start gate anyway. While the pre-race focus had been entirely on her ruptured ACL, the crash itself resulted in a tibia fracture in her left leg. The 41-year-old Team USA star Lindsey Vonn suffered a "complex tibia fracture" when she crashed in the Olympic downhill race on Sunday. Vonn was airlifted about 80 miles away and "underwent an orthopedic operation to stabilize a fracture reported in her left leg," a Treviso hospital told the Associated Press in a statement. ## From Glory to Gold: Breezy Johnson's Perfect Timing The U.S. athlete claims the Olympic title in a time of 1:36.10. Germany's Emma Aicher wins silver as Italy's Sofia Goggia takes bronze. In doing so, she became just the second American woman to win Olympic downhill gold, joining Vonn, who captured the title in 2010. "Her coach said she was cheering for me in the helicopter," Johnson said afterward. The 30-year-old from Jackson Hole had her own Cortina demons. In 2022, she crashed and injured her right knee on training run in Cortina, which kept her from competing in the Beijing Games. While celebrating, the ribbon attached to the medal broke away. Johnson's medal fell and was broken into three pieces. Even her gold medal couldn't survive the chaos of this sport. ## The Medical Reality Behind the Madness "I was simply 5 inches too tight on my line when my right arm hooked inside of the gate, twisting me and resulted in my crash. My ACL and past injuries had nothing to do with my crash whatsoever." Multiple additional surgeries will be needed to "fix [her leg] properly," Vonn said. On February 9, 2026, Vonn released a statement from her hospital bed, confirming that she will require multiple surgeries to fully repair the damage. She had returned to elite ski racing last season after nearly six years, a remarkable decision given her age, but she also had a partial titanium knee replacement in her right knee. She came to the Olympics as the leader in the World Cup downhill standings and was a gold medal favorite before her crash in Switzerland nine days ago. The mathematics were always brutal. Forty-one years old, titanium in one knee, zero ACL in the other, racing at 80 mph down a mountain that has broken careers before. This injury is expected to end her competitive career. Some dreams don't get fairy tale endings. They get helicopters.