Vonn confident heading to games
Lindsey Vonn heads to the Vancouver Olympics happy and healthy after enjoying a perfect Sunday.
“Now I feel like I’m ready,” Vonn said after winning a super-G race at St. Moritz, Switzerland, her final World Cup event before the Feb. 12-28 games.
“I’m definitely in the best shape I’ve ever been in. Mentally and physically prepared.”
Vonn kept her promise to first take care of World Cup business.
She extended her lead in the overall standings, clinched the super-G title with two races to spare and took instant revenge against a course that on Saturday tricked her out of a chance to go unbeaten all season in downhill.
Vonn completed her 26-race, pre-Olympic program with nine wins, confident and injury-free.
“I’m really relieved that I made it through the World Cup with no injuries,” Vonn said. “That is absolutely the worst thing that could possibly happen. It’s kind of been on my mind.”
Rahlves injured
Daron Rahlves and Casey Puckett are supposed to be a couple of feel-good Olympic stories – two 30-something veterans heading back to the games to give it one more shot in the crazy new freestyle sport of skicross.
After a rough week at the Winter X Games, though, it’s no sure thing either man will make it to Vancouver.
Rahlves took a nasty tumble in a quarterfinal race Sunday and had to be transported to the hospital, where his dislocated right hip was popped back into place. That came two days after Puckett, skiing alone in a less-harrowing qualifying run, hit a bump awkwardly and aggravated his already injured shoulder.
Neither has been declared out for the Olympic debut of skicross, set for Feb. 21. Both, however, leave the Winter X Games in worse shape than they came.
Puckett, hoping to compete at his fifth Olympics, said his injury should set back his recovery process at least a few days; he separated his shoulder in a race Jan. 13.
Rahlves, slated for his fourth Olympics, was putting pressure on the hip only hours after the accident and was released from the hospital Sunday night. The doctor who treated him said the fact this is his fourth dislocation should make the injury more manageable.