On a Sunday morning filled with all kinds of emotion, American Breezy Johnson won the women’s Olympic downhill race. It was the first gold medal of Johnson’s career and the first awarded to the United States at the 2026 Winter Olympics.
"It's pretty sweet," Johnson told NBC's Cara Banks after the gold-worthy performance. "Sometimes good things maybe do come to those who wait."
Johnson’s triumph in Cortina officially closed the loop on her full-circle moment. Just weeks before the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing, she crashed in a training run and injured her knee, which forced her to miss the Games. The place the heartbreak occurred? The Tofane Alpine Skiing Centre in Cortina.
Four years later, on the same course, Johnson became only the second American woman in Alpine skiing history to win Olympic downhill gold. The first was Lindsey Vonn at the Vancouver Games in 2010.
"I think part of what hurt the most in 2022 was that I did love this course," she said. "Sometimes the things you love can hurt you the most. Just because it's beautiful doesn't mean that it can also hurt. It means that you have to go and make that possible. And so taking ownership of that is what I've been trying to do for the last four years. Today it paid off."
With the victory, the 30-year-old added another piece of hardware to her rapidly expanding collection. She was a double world champion in 2025, securing gold in the downhill and team combined — alongside Mikaela Shiffrin (USA) — in Salbaach, Austria.
Speaking of Shiffrin, the Olympic slalom gold medal favorite posted a video of her live reaction to Johnson's victory. She cheered on her Olympic teammate, expressing a mix of excitement, stress and relief.
"It never gets easier to watch 🫣😅🫠 @breezyjohnsonski… your first Olympic medal, and it’s gold?! GIRL 👏👏👏"
Emma Aicher of Germany took silver, finishing four-hundredths of a second behind Johnson (+0.04), the blink of an eye. The 22-year-old has four victories on the World Cup circuit (the highest level of professional Alpine skiing competition), all coming within the last year. Aicher's star is on the rise, and it shined brighter than ever on Sunday.
Local hero Sofia Goggia snagged bronze in front of the Italian faithful (+0.59). It was the Bergamo, Lombardy native’s third Olympic medal. In 2018, she won gold in the PyeongChang downhill, and like Johnson, hurt her knee in a Cortina crash weeks before the Beijing Games. With a partially torn ACL and minor fibula fracture, she still managed to secure silver in Beijing.
The Milan Cortina bronze completes an "Olympic downhill medal podium" for Goggia, having collected one of each color.
Wearing the 13th bib, Lindsey Vonn (USA) crashed hard moments into her run. The 41-year-old clipped a race gate, twisted in the air and thudded onto the Tofane snow, tumbling down the piste.
When she finally came to a stop, the energized crowd fell silent. A course hold was put into place and medical personnel rushed to attend to the St. Paul, Minnesota native.
After about 15 minutes, Vonn was airlifted via off the slope for further evaluation.
U.S. Ski & Snowboard provided an update:
"Lindsey Vonn sustained an injury, but is in stable condition and in good hands with a team of American and Italian physicians."
It was the second time in two weeks that a helicopter carried the all-time great off a mountain. Vonn initially sustained a "completely ruptured" at a World Cup event in Crans Montana, Switzerland.
Despite the ailment, she remained confident that she would be able to race the Olympic downhill, participating in intense workouts and completing multiple downhill training runs. She actually finished with the third fastest time in Saturday's training.
Sunday's crash was a heartbreaking chapter of her 2026 Winter Olympic story.
Vonn wasn't the only athlete who struggled to navigate the Tofane slopes. Skis rattled on the uneven surface, causing many racers to stumble and two others to crash, which included Cande Moreno (AND). She too was airlifted off the mountain.
American Jackie Wiles nearly claimed a medal, coming in fourth (+0.59). She finished less than three-tenths of a second behind the third-place Goggia.
The Olympic Alpine skiing action returns to Peacock and NBCOlympics.com on Monday at 4:30 a.m. ET with the men's downhill portion of the team combined. The slalom will follow at 8:00 a.m. ET.