The resounding answer on social media was no. The answer from the skiing community is yes.
“People who don’t know ski racing don’t really understand what happened yesterday,” Vonn’s teammate Keely Cashman said Monday. “She got her hand caught on the gate, which caused her to twist around. She was probably going 70 miles an hour, and that twists your body around.”
Vonn lost control within seconds of leaving the start house on Sunday, clipping the gate with his right shoulder and pinwheeling down the slope before falling awkwardly onto his back, his skis criss-crossed beneath him and his screams echoed as medical personnel arrived.
She was taken to a clinic in Cortina and then transferred to a larger hospital in Treviso, a two-hour drive to the south. “Vaughn underwent orthopedic surgery to stabilize a fracture in his left leg,” Ca’ Fonsello hospital said in a statement.
The hospital initially said it would issue an update on Monday, then said more details about Vaughn’s condition would come from their team.
Lindsey Vonn’s father, Alan Kildow, declined to comment on the details of Vonn’s injuries, but described how she was emotionally.
“He’s a very strong person,” Kildow told The Associated Press on Monday. “She knows physical pain, and she understands the situations she finds herself in. And she’s been able to handle it. Better than I expected. She’s a very, very strong person. And so I think she’s handling it really well.”
Kildow said that, if it were up to her, Vonn would no longer race after her latest accident.
Cashman, who was knocked unconscious in a serious accident five years earlier, defended what happened to Vaughn. He said Vonn’s accident “had nothing to do with her ACL, nothing to do with her knee” and described the public’s perceptions as “completely wrong”.
“I think a lot of people are scoffing at it, and a lot of people don’t know what’s going on,” Cashman said.
Vonn, the four-time overall World Cup champion, looked like an Olympic contender after returning to competition after nearly six years. But on January 30, a training accident in Switzerland left him with a torn ACL and a bone bruise and damaged meniscus.
Before Sunday’s ill-fated race, she continued to prepare for the Olympics and completed several downhill training runs in the lead up to the Games.
The hours following Vaughn’s accident were filled with opinion, mostly of a second-guessing nature, such as: Should someone have intervened?
“It’s their choice,” said Federica Brignone, an experienced Italian skier. “If it’s your body, you decide what to do, whether to run or not. It doesn’t depend on others. Only on you.”
American downhiller Kyle Negomir echoed that thought.
Negomir said, “Lindsay is an adult woman and the best speed skier the sport has ever seen. If she’s made her decision, I think she should be allowed to take that risk.” “She’s obviously so good that she’s been able to accomplish it. Just because it didn’t happen yesterday doesn’t mean it certainly wasn’t a possibility she could crush it and have a perfect run.”
When she arrived in Cortina last week, Vonn said she had consulted with her team of physicians and trainers before deciding whether to proceed with racing. The International Ski and Snowboard Federation does not investigate the injury status of athletes.
“I firmly believe that this has to be decided by the individual athlete,” FIS president Johan Elias said in Bormio on Monday. “And in her case, she certainly knows the injuries to her body better than anyone else. And if you look at all the athletes here today, the athletes of tomorrow, every single athlete has had some type of minor injury.
“It’s also important for people to understand that the accident she had yesterday was incredibly unfortunate. It was one in 1,000. She came too close to the gate, and while she was in the air in the gate she got stuck and spun. No one can recover from that unless you do a 360. … It’s something that’s part of ski racing. It’s a dangerous sport.”
International Olympic Committee sports director Pierre Ducré said Vonn was able to train and that experts had advised her decision.
He added, “So from that perspective, I don’t think we can say that he should or should not have participated. That decision was really up to him and his team to make.” “He made the decision and unfortunately it led to an injury, but I think that’s really the way the decision is made for every athlete who participates in downhill.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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