"He definitely pushed me in the direction of success, and I liked it," Vonn told the New York Times a long time ago, before the last Olympic games, before she stopped speaking publicly about the rift. "It was more in the later years, when he wanted to keep doing that. Let's just say it didn't work out."
Vonn, the face of these Olympics when they began 12 days ago, returns to the slopes today after a 3-day hiatus from racing that allowed her to rest and treat the bruised right shin that has tempered both enthusiasm for and expectation of a big medal haul in these Olympics. She has a gold medal in the downhill and a bronze in the Super-G and a crash in the super combined, but she would need a best-ever performance in today's giant slalom to even contend for a spot on the podium, which on a bad hoof, seems highly unlikely.
So for one day at least, one race, Vonn is not expected to be extraordinary. It's one reason why she seemed so upbeat in her Facebook entry yesterday, writing, "It feels kind of nice to be the underdog."
Even for skiing's Goliath, it's nice to get your David on once in a while.
It's the lingering paradox of Vonn's star-crossed career. At 5-10, 165 pounds-plus, she can attack a hill in a way her peers cannot, with moxie and muscle and frightening abandon. She skis on men's skis. Athletically she is her sport's Wilt, with Bill Russell's mentality and Willis Reed's tolerance of pain.
So what's not to like?
This: Just when it seems she has too much for the course, for her competition, something bad often happens. In a sport in which crashes are routine, even expected, Vonn's have been habitually ill-placed and incredibly ill-timed.
