Overview
- Lindsey Vonn, speaking in a new Vanity Fair cover story, recounts the searing pain after her Milano‑Cortina crash and says doctors warned she could lose her leg.
- Her care team identified compartment syndrome, a condition where swelling traps blood in the limb, and Team USA physician Tom Hackett performed an emergency fasciotomy to relieve the pressure.
- The downhill crash on February 8 left Vonn with fractures to her tibia, fibula and ankle, led to multiple surgeries in Italy and the United States, and required heavy narcotics that barely touched the pain.
- Vonn describes chaotic moments during her transfer to a Treviso hospital when paparazzi swarmed the helipad, and says roughly 20 clinicians scrubbed in to work on her leg.
- Now rehabbing at home in Utah with daily physical therapy and hyperbaric sessions, she has shown gym progress, paid tribute to her late mother in a heartfelt post, and says she is not ready to decide on retirement after returning to the sport at 40 and leading the downhill standings.