Lindsey Vonn, at 40, returns to competitive skiing, earns World Cup eligibility

Nearly six years after her retirement, American alpine skiing legend Lindsey Vonn returned to competition this weekend in Copper Mountain, Colo., with two races each in the downhill and Super-G.

The 40-year-old Vonn finished 24th and 27th, respectively, out of the 40 skiers who finished the FIS Fall Festival downhill runs on Saturday, followed by finishes of 24th (out of 31) and 19th (out of 28) in the Super-G on Sunday.

The event is a level below the top-tier World Cup circuit but featured several top skiers who were training for next weekend’s World Cup event in the same venue. Her performance earned her the eligibility to request a wild card into World Cup races, the FIS — international skiing’s governing body — confirmed to The Athletic.

“Well … after a solid weekend of races I am now qualified to race World Cup!” Vonn posted Sunday on X. “Now let’s see when I’m ready.”

Last month, Vonn — an 82-time World Cup event winner and a former Olympic and world champion — announced she intended to make a comeback almost six years after her retirement following the World Championships in February 2019. A knee injury ended her career then, but she had the knee replaced earlier this year and found herself pain-free, sparking the idea of a return.

She’s hoping to be competitive again in World Cup races and, if she can defy the odds and regain something like her old form, potentially qualify for the 2026 Olympics. The women’s alpine skiing competition will be held in Cortina d’Ampezzo, where Vonn has logged 12 World Cup victories in her career.

“I’m trying not to get too far ahead of myself because I have quite a few hoops to jump through,” Vonn told the New York Times last month, adding that she “can’t say right now if it’s a possibility” to compete in Cortina.

This weekend was her first step back. In an Instagram post Friday, she called the races a “training opportunity to keep on building” and said, “100% will come in time but not tomorrow.”

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Vonn’s time of 1:07.23 in the first downhill run Saturday was 1.44 seconds off the pace of the winner, Austria’s Mirjam Puchner, the silver medalist in the Super-G at the 2022 Beijing Olympics. In the second race, she finished in 1:07.52, 1.53 seconds behind winner Cornelia Huetter of Austria, the defending World Cup downhill champion.

“Today was a solid start and I had a blast being in start with my teammates again!” Vonn posted on X after Saturday’s runs. “While I’m sure people will speculate and say I’m not in top form because of the results, I disagree. This was training for me. I’m still testing equipment and getting back in the groove. This is only the beginning.”

On Sunday, her Super-G times of 1:14.09 and 1:13.95, respectively, were both over two seconds off the winning pace of fellow American Lauren Macuga. Macuga won with nearly identical times of 1:11.90 and 1:11.89.

FIS regulations allow wild cards for retired skiers who have succeeded at the highest levels of the sport once they’ve achieved minimum points requirements. The U.S. Ski & Snowboard must request a wild card for Vonn for any events. Her plans beyond Copper Mountain have not been announced.

When she retired, Vonn was the most successful American World Cup skier of all time, with 82 individual event wins. That was second to Sweden’s Ingemar Stenmark for the most all time in alpine skiing. At the time, a 24-year-old American named Mikaela Shiffrin sat well behind her with 56 victories. But since, Shiffrin — who was injured last week in a World Cup event in Vermont — has reeled off 43 more World Cup event wins to reset the record and sit one shy of the 100 mark.

She won the World Championship golds in the downhill and Super-G in 2009 and was the overall World Cup winner four times between 2008 and 2012.

Vonn was a member of four U.S. Olympic teams between 2002 and 2018, winning three medals, including gold in the downhill in Vancouver in 2010. But knee injuries recurred throughout her career and kept her out of the 2014 Olympics in Sochi, Russia.

With her knee free of pain and a new opportunity, Vonn is back to see where it all goes, possibly to a most unlikely Olympic bid.

“It’s been 6 years since I last raced so I still have a lot of equipment to test, finding my groove and really getting into racing form,” she said in her Instagram post. “I am having a lot of fun and want to keep on doing so!”