Having secured her spot for the 2026 Olympic Games a fortnight prior, Lindsey Vonn augmented her illustrious career achievements with another win at the World Cup downhill competition held in Austria on Saturday.
The competitor, aged 41, outpaced Kajsa Vickhoff Lie from Norway by 0.37 seconds, securing her second downhill triumph on the World Cup circuit in four starts this period. The individual, who claimed Olympic downhill gold in 2010 and is a four-time World Cup general champion, achieved a speed of 81 miles per hour, ranking among the highest recorded by female skiers this season.
This particular triumph marked the 84th occasion Vonn has stood atop the podium in her remarkable professional journey — placing her two victories short of the overall women’s record established by Ingemar Stenmark of Sweden — and it also extended her own record to 45 wins specifically in the downhill discipline.
“I understood precisely what would be required to achieve success today,” Vonn remarked following the event. “It felt like a dash, and I needed to exert my maximum effort, certainly embracing some degree of peril.”
Vonn had stepped away from professional competition in 2019, yet she experienced a resurgence of her competitive drive subsequent to viewing the 2022 Olympic Games hosted in Beijing. She underwent a knee replacement procedure in 2024, and then, in December, she secured her initial World Cup victory in almost six years, thereby affirming her return to the sport.
“I possess a clear understanding of my current position and my aspirations, and my physique is reacting precisely as I desired,” Vonn stated. “I feel robust. I am capable of executing turns with a sharp arc, or I can perform wide, sweeping turns. Whatever maneuver I choose, I am able to accomplish it. And that sensation is extraordinary because my body has not consistently cooperated in such a manner previously. Consequently, the situation is entirely different now, and it is a fantastic feeling. I endeavor to relish every single moment I spend competing because experiencing high speeds is simply exhilarating.”
The ladies’ Olympic downhill event is scheduled for February 8th at the Tofane Alpine Skiing Centre in Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy. Vonn boasts a dozen World Cup victories on the Cortina slopes and views the venue as providing her with a distinct home-ground benefit.
