Published>Thu, Feb 11 10 07:14 AM
The pre-Games hype dubbed them the Vonn-couver Olympics, but the big show is in danger of losing its leading lady before the curtain is raised and organisers hope the script turns more feelgood than horror.
Lindsey Vonn was poised to set the Games alight; she was the face of the U.S. Olympic team that has swept all before her in a crushing season of domination on the World Cup Alpine skiing circuit.
With a clutch of endorsements befitting her status, Vonn was set to sweep aside her rivals on the piste of Whistler Mountain but a training run injury to her shin picked up in Austria last week threatens to ruin her Games and leave organisers looking for another marquee name to pick up the marketing baton.
The 25-year-old from Minnesota is the most successful female American skier ever, has dominated the speed events on the World Cup circuit this season and there has been talk of her making a clean sweep of the gold medals.
But now her focus is, not for the first time at a big event, on her fitness rather than her form.
"I've dealt with a lot injuries before, and I've always been able to persevere," she told reporters on Wednesday as she sought to put on a brave face.
"Knowing that I have done it before definitely gives me a lot of confidence," she added.
Vonn has around a dozen endorsement deals in place including contracts with companies like Cover Girl cosmetics and Secret deodorant, not traditionally known for signing up skiers.
BIGGEST STIR
She was on the cover of Sports Illustrated, the U.S's top sports magazine, last week in a pose that caused some discussion and an even bigger stir is expected for her racy pictures in the annual swimsuit edition of the magazine this month.
Her absence could run deep for these Games.
"Lindsey Vonn was going to be one of the great stars of these Olympics and probably the standout American heading into these Games," Robert Boland, professor of sports management at New York University, told Reuters.
"I think it could be a huge story not just for Lindsey Vonn, which is a personal one, but it could be a big one for the success of the TV ratings and the attractiveness of these Games in the U.S."
But perhaps the headlines about the 'Vonn-couver Games' were tempting fate because the American has gone from the hyped up hope to the wounded heroine before.
Four years ago, in training for the Turin Games, Vonn, then known by her maiden name Kildow, suffered a painful back injury after crashing halfway down the Fraiteve Olympic piste in San Sicario.
Vonn, lost control, did the splits and then tumbled spectacularly down the icy course before being flown by helicopter down the Italian mountains to hospital in Turin.
Then, as now, the talk was of battling against pain, of doing it all against the odds but as each event passed, it become increasingly evident that the U.S's medal hope was struggling to reproduce her best.
GUTSY PERFORMANCE
Vonn was released after an overnight hospital stay and earned plaudits -- and a U.S ski award -- for her gutsy performance as she raced through the pain barrier to eighth in the downhill.
She then finished seventh in the super-G and 14th in the slalom -- creditable results in the circumstances but not ones she would find in any way acceptable this time around.
The difference between Turin and Vancouver is that this time she arrives at the Games, not as a promising youngster with medal dreams, but as the undisputed number one in women's skiing and a woman who is simply expected to win gold medals.
The other difference is that the shin injury is more serious, more painful and more of a hamper to her efforts than the more noticeably gained back injury four years ago.
Whereas 48 hours after he crash in Turin, Vonn was racing a downhill, this time she has not skied for a week since her injury.
"It is the most painful injury I have ever had," Vonn said on Wednesday. "It's going to be very challenging and difficult."
Vonn's big event jinx also struck in 2009 at the world championships in Val d'Isere when, in celebrating her win in the downhill, she cut her right thumb opening up a bottle of champagne.
At first the American laughed off the injury but it proved more serious than she thought.
She had surgery to repair a damaged tendon and had to skip the giant slalom and although she took part in the slalom she skied out in the second run.
This time there has been no laughing.
Source: Web Search
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