Olympics
Brains
In one of the most talked-about storylines at the 2026 Winter Olympics, American alpine legend Lindsey Vonn is preparing to compete in the women’s downhill despite suffering a completely ruptured anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) in her left knee just days before the Games.
The 41-year-old skiing legend officially confirmed a “completely ruptured” ACL in her left knee along with bone bruising and meniscal damage after a crash at a World Cup downhill in Crans-Montana, Switzerland, last weekend. Yet, at a press conference ahead of Sunday’s Olympic downhill, she said her knee was not swollen and that she feels confident she can race, with the support of a knee brace and intensive physical therapy.
Typically, a fully ruptured ACL is considered a season-ending injury, commonly requiring surgical reconstruction and up to a year of rehabilitation before an athlete can return to high-impact competition. According to orthopedic guidelines, recovery from ACL reconstruction typically spans nine months to a year, with athletes gradually rebuilding strength and stability before resuming competitive action.
Yet, skiing with a torn ACL is not unheard of at the elite level, and medical experts say it is possible—though risky and not typical. “Skiing is possible with a ruptured ACL,” Dr. Catherine Logan, an orthopedic surgeon at the Joint Preservation Center in Denver, Colorado, said in an interview with The Associated Press. Logan has worked with U.S. ski, snowboard and lacrosse teams with high-level skiers and athletes. “It really relies on quad strength, hip strength and neuromuscular control.”
In other words, the body can sometimes compensate for a missing ligament, if the surrounding muscles, particularly the quadriceps and hip stabilizers, are exceptionally strong and coordinated. A torn ACL normally impairs the knee’s ability to resist forward translation of the tibia, but well-trained athletes can recruit other muscle groups and neuromuscular strategies to help stabilize the knee during controlled movements. In Vonn’s case, doctors advised that her knee was stable enough to attempt training and racing, and she returned to practice runs at Cortina d’Ampezzo wearing a supportive brace. Her coach and teammates noted Vonn’s experience skiing intelligently and in control, and her ability to load and unload the injured leg effectively during high-speed turns.
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As remarkable as Vonn’s plan to compete is, she is far from the only Alpine skier to compete with a torn ACL—or even two. Switzerland’s Joana Hählen, for years one of the World Cup’s competitive downhillers and super-G skiers, has famously skied and raced with torn ACLs in both knees. When she crashed during the 2024 downhill race at Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy, she was first diagnosed with a torn ACL in her right knee, but a later review revealed that the ligament had already been completely torn prior to that race and had, in fact, been competing with a torn ACL for years. To make her case even more impressive, Hählen had been competing with a torn ACL in her left knee since 2017. The Swiss athlete had suffered multiple ACL tears and other ligament injuries in both legs during her careers, and after initial surgeries, decided in 2017 to forego yet another surgery in her left knee and opted for conservative, non-surgical management. With the targeted help of strength training, physiotherapy and neuromuscular conditioning to compensate for mechanical instability, Hählen was able to continue competing. She has said that she “was never really unstable” and learned to adapt her muscle strength and movement patterns over time to keep skiing competitively.
Vonn’s teammates Landon Wendler and Liz Lemley have also competed with torn ACLs in moguls skiing but, unlike Hählen, opted for surgery at a later stage.
But experts also warn that Vonn’s decision is not without danger. Without a functioning ACL, the knee can be prone to instability under extreme load, particularly at downhill race speeds where forces through the leg are immense. Some doctors say this could lead to further damage to cartilage, menisci or other ligaments if the knee buckles or twists. Without the ACL’s mechanical restraint, higher forces during dynamic movements—such as alpine turns or sudden direction changes—can place abnormal stress on surrounding structures. In skiing, where forces can exceed 3,000 newtons across the knee joint, the absence of an ACL significantly increases the potential for further injury. However, Vonn is only intending to compete in a maximum of three events—downhill, super-g, and combined, so the risk should be minimal.
- Related: After Lindsey Vonns Crash: Controversy After Canceled Downhill Race as Racers Vent Frustration
Medical research supports the idea that some athletes can continue exerting high forces on a knee without an ACL — but only under specific conditions. Studies have found that athletes who return to sport after ACL injury or reconstruction often rely on increased activation of muscle groups around the knee, particularly the quadriceps and hamstrings, to compensate for ligament deficiency. Strong neuromuscular control—the coordinated firing of muscles to stabilize joints—is critical. With her own long-standing history of knee injuries, Vonn certainly falls into that camp, explaining why the U.S. athlete has reported not experiencing any instability in her knee.
For most people, a torn ACL is career-ending until repaired. But some athletes like Vonn and Hählen have shown that, with exceptional strength, conditioning, muscle control, bracing and medical guidance, it’s possible to continue performing at high levels under extraordinary circumstances. Vonn’s decision to compete at Milano-Cortina is rooted not in recklessness, but in a combination of physiology, preparation and belief in her own body’s ability to adapt, which other athletes before her have also achieved.
Never a good idea to compete with an injury. You just open yourself up to much worse damage,