Lindsey Vonn wins gold in downhill despite all obstacles

WHISTLER, B.C. — Obstacle No. 1: The shin. Bruised to the bone, it left Lindsey Vonn, now inarguably the greatest skier ever from America, thinking her Games were over before they began.

Obstacle No. 2: The mountain. The steep, curvy, ice-bumped women's downhill course on Franz's Run at Whistler Creekside, had been widely hailed as one of the toughest in the world. Wednesday, it lived up to that billing — and then some.

The first skier, Klara Krizova of the Czech Republic, fell halfway down, skiing into the finish area with the look of someone just run over by a snowmobile. The tone had been set.

Several other racers were so spent crossing the finish line that they kerplowed into the safety pad at the bottom — which is normally there just for appearances. One of them, Noelle Barahona of Chile, actually disappeared beneath it, one ski flailing while course workers extricated her from under the foam rubber.

Perhaps all of that got to Marion Rolland, of France, one of the later starters. She took three strides out of the starting gate, lost her balance, and fell, still on the entry ramp. In all, seven racers failed to finish.

A bit intimidating, the course.

Still, with history on the line, neither obstacle was likely to keep Vonn — most days, a half-second faster than all of planet Earth in the downhill — off the top of the podium, her home-away-from Vail for the past few years.

But Problem No. 3 was not so easily solved: Julia Mancuso.

To casual observers, Mancuso, the gold medalist in giant slalom from Turin four years ago, was an improbable threat here. Her days since that crowning achievement have been spent surfing, blogging, living the good life — and largely failing to live up to ski-world expectations.

But she has always been, competitors say, a "big-race skier." And she considered this a fairly big race.

Mancuso, skiing eighth and blocking out the early-race carnage, sliced through the rutted course like a knife, finishing a stunning nine-tenths of a second faster than the field.

It was, she said, her kind of course, lots of white-knuckle turns, little gliding. And for 1 minute, 45 seconds, she owned it.

Thomas Vonn, former U.S. ski racer and current Mr. Lindsey, watched it happen from the finish area and radioed up his two-time overall World Cup champion wife: "You're going to have to ski your best race to beat her. You can do it."

It was critical information.

"She's been in a place a lot of the time this year where she can back it off to 90 percent and still win a race," he explained.

Not an option this day.

So Lindsey Vonn, 25, commenced to do what she does every time she steps into the starting gate: Ski like no other woman before her.

The pain in the leg was there, absolutely. "It hurt the entire way down," she said. But adrenaline — with some help from numbing cream and just about every home-brew pain-reducing treatment imaginable — made it manageable.

"I think," observed her husband, who has felt that Olympic surge as a competitor himself, "she could have skied without a foot today and been fine."

When she came screaming home, collapsing on the ground and thrusting one arm in triumph, she had blown away Mancuso's time by more than half a second. Only two racers remaining had a shot at knocking the Americans off the top two rungs.

Vonn's good friend Maria Riesch of Germany, was stuck in the start gate waiting after yet another crash and never really got it going, finishing more than 2 seconds off the pace.

The second, Anje Paerson of Sweden, was ready to spoil the party when Whistler Peak struck its last — and most painful — blow of the race. Paerson was a third of a second off Vonn's pace — and faster than Mancuso — as she neared the finish line.

But coming off the final jump, Paerson sailed far higher than other racers and then, like an airplane entering a stall, dropped straight to the ground, crumpling and accelerating like a rag doll down the final pitch.

No one would catch Vonn and Mancuso, the first 1-2 Olympic podium combination for U.S. alpine skiers since 1984. The third-place finisher, Elisabeth Goergl of Austria, was almost 1.5 seconds off the pace.

That's not just a win, it's a blowout. And it portends perhaps a record showing for America's alpine team at the 2010 Games.

Vonn went from a popular favorite to win five medals here — never really likely in the unpredictable world of ski racing — to a person lucky to just compete. Now, she's all the way back in sky's-the-limit land.

Two races for the U.S. alpine team. Three medals, and counting. Vonn races again Thursday in the super combined. And if there was any doubt about her ability to shut out the pain and turn on the gas, it is now removed.

"I'm overwhelmed," she said when the crowd finally funneled out. "This is the best day of my life — by far. A huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders."

If the rest of the world was shaken by Whistler peak, wait until they get a look at a relaxed Lindsey Vonn.

"I got the gold medal that I came here to get," she said. "Now I'm going to just attack every day, with no regrets and no fear."

Ron Judd: 206-464-8280 or at rjudd@seattletimes.com