Vonn completes downhill leg, skips slalom
Posted February 11, 2011 2:45 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
GARMISCH-PARTENKIRCHEN, Germany — Lindsey Vonn put aside her competitive instinct and made the difficult decision to withdraw mid-race from the super-combined at the world championships on Friday.
Still “skiing in a fog” as she recovers from a mild concussion, the race favourite instead watched the slalom leg in a dark and quiet room on doctor’s orders.
Vonn completed the downhill leg of the super-combined, finishing an uncharacteristic 12th, 1.6 seconds behind Austrian leader Elisabeth Goergl. Another Austrian, Anna Fenninger, went on to win.
She’s still hoping to defend her title in Sunday’s downhill race. After that, she appears likely to also skip her remaining events of slalom and giant slalom.
“I’m 90 per cent sure that I will be going home after the downhill,” Vonn said.
In hindsight, she said she shouldn’t have raced in the super-G on Tuesday — she placed seventh — but was too stubborn to pull out. She didn’t make the same mistake twice on Friday.
“I accept now I can’t do anything about (the concussion), but I’m not going to race if I don’t feel safe and I don’t feel 100 per cent, and I don’t feel 100 per cent yet, so it’s really the only decision that I can make, and unfortunately it’s the hardest one to make.”
Vonn was in contention on the top section of the course, but gradually dropped behind as she made her way down.
“Unfortunately I lost focus about three-quarters, halfway down the course,” Vonn said. “It wasn’t as bad as it was in the super-G by any means, but I definitely felt it still.”
Vonn landed on her head in giant slalom training in Hinterreit, Austria, last week, and was clearly not herself in the super-G.
“It’s like skiing in a fog,” she said. “The reaction isn’t there. I’m just kind of slow and I’m not able to be aggressive. Things kind of come at me, and I feel like I can’t really do anything. It’s kind of hard to explain, but it’s not a great feeling.”
Vonn skied despite a severely bruised shin to win gold in downhill and bronze in super-G at last year’s Vancouver Olympics, but this injury was obviously different.
“You could basically tie my arm behind my back and I would still be racing — anything else I could deal with,” she said. “There’s not much I can do with this — just wait and see and hope for the best. It’s unfortunately the way life goes sometimes.”
U.S. women’s team head physician William Sterett has been performing concussion protocol exams on Vonn several times daily — all of which she has passed — but he’s still advising her to give her brain a rest.
So much so, Vonn couldn’t even go out and watch her fellow racers in the slalom leg.
“The doctors say the only thing you can do really for a concussion is to stay in a dark room with not very much stimulation, so I will be in a dark room probably watching the race from the TV,” she said. “I would love to be in the finish, but I don’t think that’s the right move to be healthy for tomorrow and Sunday.”
Vonn was considering missing Saturday’s final downhill training as well.
“At least now I’ve skied the run in my downhill suit,” she said. “I know the speeds, I know the bumps, I know the line, so I’m feeling confident from that aspect. It’s just a matter of really being able to focus from top to bottom and that’s really all that’s missing right now.”
