RISING ABOVE

LINDSEY VONN WRITES OF COPING WITH DEPRESSION AND GUILT DURING HER STELLAR CAREER

IN HER NEW MEMOIR three-time Olympic medalist Lindsey Vonn writes, “Following [my] divorce, my family was disappointed that I didn’t want to change my name back to Kildow, but by that point, Lindsey Vonn was who I was. I had built up this alter ego, like my version of a company name.”

The idea of dual Lindseys is a recurring theme in Rise. At 12, she was a bemulleted introvert who broke up with a kid on Valentine’s Day because he was moving too fast when he called her “babe.” At the same time she was fiercely confident and successful on the slopes. As she got older, she continued to be a self-described “pushover” whenever she wasn’t able to “[play] the Lindsey Vonn character” in her personal life while amassing one of the greatest résumés of any skier in history.

How Vonn achieved her skiing success is interesting enough, but her story is far more compelling when she’s not on the mountain.

Now 37, Vonn has wrestled with a fair amount of guilt: Her mother nearly died giving birth to her, and she believes her parents divorced because they had to uproot the family, from suburban Minneapolis to Vail, so she could train. Vonn has also dealt with depression, and her marriage, to her first serious boyfriend, ended when she was 27. (She does not mention her relationships with Tiger Woods and NHL star P.K. Subban.) “[S]kiing hid most of my issues, because it was a way to channel my emotions,” she writes. “I think that’s why some of the best seasons of my career happened when everything around me was falling apart. But eventually, I needed to figure my s--- out.”

That journey toward self-discovery drives Rise. It’s a work in progress—she points out her depression worsened in retirement because she couldn’t “compartmentalize [her] feelings and just focus on training”—but also a reminder that not only is Lindsey Vonn an amazing skier, she’s a fascinating character as well.

QUEEN OF THE HILL Vonn retired with 82 World Cup wins, second all-time to Ingemar Stenmark.