Lindsey Vonn places 15th in downhill at ski worlds. She called it a 'practice run for the Olympics'

SAALBACH-HINTERGLEMM, Austria (AP) — One spot ahead of Sofia Goggia. Four spots ahead of Malorie Blanc, the emerging Swiss racer 19 years her junior.

A 15th-place result in the world championship downhill may have marked unchartered territory for Lindsey Vonn on Saturday. After all, the American had never finished outside the top 10 in her best event at a worlds or Olympics.

But it was still respectable, and better than the majority of the 33-woman field.

Having only recently returned to ski racing at age 40 with a new titanium knee, and having hooked her right arm on a gate in the super-G two days earlier while fighting off cold- and flu-like symptoms all week, Vonn called her performance “good progress.”

“Of course (at) world championships I always have high expectations of myself. And when everything is working together, I know what I’m capable of,” she said. “Right now, I don’t have all the puzzle pieces put together. I have the corners. I’m missing some of the middle pieces. But all in all, the biggest goal was to have a plan and execute it.”

Vonn’s long-term goal remains being competitive at next year’s Milan-Cortina Olympics. She told The Associated Press in a recent interview that she plans to retire again after the Olympic skiing competition in Cortina d’Ampezzo, where she holds the record of 12 World Cup wins.

“In the start, I put pressure on myself as if it was a practice run for the Olympics, and I did exactly what I came here to do,” Vonn said. “Clearly, not everything is working as well as it should. I know I can be stronger. I know I can get my material to work better. It’s like jumping in a Formula 1 car and having no training.”

Vonn’s longtime ski technician Heinz Haemmerle retired, so her equipment supplier Head assigned her Chris Krause, who formerly worked for Didier Cuche and Bode Miller, for her comeback. But then Krause got sick, so she was assigned yet another technician, Rene Meusburger.

“A lot of pieces are on the board but not in the right place,” Vonn said. “It’s good progress. I’m ahead of Sofi (Goggia). And I think in Cortina, she’s the No. 1 one person to beat there. So it’s not like I’m skiing badly."

Vonn finished 1.96 seconds behind the winner, American teammate Breezy Johnson.

Lauren Macuga, another American, placed fifth to follow up her bronze medal in super-G two days earlier.

“I think that’s amazing for Lindsey,” Macuga said. “It’s so impressive that she’s here at world champs after six years off … And I know she’s just going to keep building."

Up next for Vonn is the team combined event on Tuesday.

The women’s downhill in Cortina for the Olympics will be held in exactly a year: on Feb. 8, 2026. So where does Vonn hope to be by then?

“Not in this same position. I’ll tell you that,” she said. “I hope to be in a much different place in a year. But I did think about that in the starting gate. That was the biggest goal for me, to bring myself to the right place mentally, have that clarity and have that precision. And I did exactly what I wanted to do. So for me mentally, that gives me a lot of confidence knowing that I can execute when the pressure’s on.”

Vonn, it should be noted, has a history of going out with a bang.

She won bronze in downhill in Pyeongchang in 2018 at what then appeared to be her final Olympics. And then took another bronze in downhill at the 2019 worlds in her final race before retiring.

Still, Vonn has faced criticism in Europe for returning to such a dangerous sport at an age that no woman of her caliber had ever raced at before.

“There’s always going to be critics, no matter what I do someone is going to talk (expletive) about me,” Vonn said. “Honestly, if you don’t have haters then you’re probably not doing that well. So bring it on.”

Associated Press writer Eric Willemsen in Vienna contributed to this report.

AP skiing: https://apnews.com/hub/alpine-skiing

United States' Breezy Johnson celebrates at the finish area of a women's downhill race, at the Alpine Ski World Championships, in Saalbach-Hinterglemm, Austria, Saturday, Feb. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Giovanni Auletta)

United States' Lindsey Vonn speeds down the course during a women's downhill race, at the Alpine Ski World Championships, in Saalbach-Hinterglemm, Austria, Saturday, Feb. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Marco Trovati)

United States' Lindsey Vonn celebrates at the finish area of a women's downhill race, at the Alpine Ski World Championships, in Saalbach-Hinterglemm, Austria, Saturday, Feb. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Giovanni Auletta)

United States' Lindsey Vonn smiles at the finish area of a women's downhill race, at the Alpine Ski World Championships, in Saalbach-Hinterglemm, Austria, Saturday, Feb. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Giovanni Auletta)

United States' Lindsey Vonn arrives at the finish area of a women's downhill race, at the Alpine Ski World Championships, in Saalbach-Hinterglemm, Austria, Saturday, Feb. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Giovanni Auletta)

United States' Lindsey Vonn is airborne during a women's downhill race, at the Alpine Ski World Championships, in Saalbach-Hinterglemm, Austria, Saturday, Feb. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Gabriele Facciotti)

WASHINGTON (AP) — Federal immigration agents newly ordered to U.S. airports by President Donald Trump to help relieve security line congestion may guard exit lanes or check passenger IDs as a budget impasse has air travelers frustrated over hourslong waits and screeners angry about missed paychecks.

Trump made clear on Sunday, a day after saying he would use immigration officers for airport security starting Monday unless Democrats agreed on a bill to fund the Department of Homeland Security, that he was going ahead with the plan to assist the Transportation Security Administration.

Hundreds of thousands of homeland security workers, including from the TSA, U.S. Secret Service and Coast Guard, have worked without pay since Congress failed to renew DHS funding last month. Democrats are demanding major changes in the conduct of federal immigration agents and showing no sign of backing down.

White House border czar Tom Homan, named by Trump to lead this effort, has also been meeting with a bipartisan group of senators in recent days over the partial shutdown and while he characterized those sessions as “good conversations,” he said they were “not at a point yet where we’re in total agreement.”

The Senate, convening in a rare weekend session, was expected to advance the nomination of Sen. Markwayne Mullin, R-Okla., to be Trump’s next homeland security secretary. A vote on the confirmation could come as early as late Monday as Mullin has tried to make the case that he would be a steady hand after the tumultuous tenure of Kristi Noem, Trump’s first DHS secretary.

Meantime, Homan said in Sunday news show interviews that the increased role of U.S. Customs and Immigrations Enforcement at airports — specific duties and numbers — was subject to discussions with the leadership of TSA and ICE “to find out where we can fit in."

He pledged to have "a plan by the end of today, where we’re sending -- what airports we’re starting with and where we’re sending them. ... So it’s a work in progress.” The priority, Homan said, was “the large airports where there’s a long wait, like three hours.”

Immigration officers, as an example, could cover exits currently monitored by TSA agents, freeing them to work screening lines.

“ICE agents are assigned at many airports across the country already. They do a lot of investigation, criminal investigation on smuggling at airports,” Homan said, adding that “certainly, a highly trained ICE law enforcement officer can cover an exit and makes sure people don’t go through those exits, entering the airport through the exits. And stuff like that relieves that TSA officer to go to screening and to reduce those lines.”

Another option, he said, was having ICE agents check identification before people enter screenings areas.

"We’re going to be a force multiplier,” Homan said.

While saying to help “wherever we can provide extra security,” Homan said there were limits. “I don’t see an ICE agent looking at an X-ray machine, because we’re not trained in that,” he said.

Trump said in a social media post that on Monday, “ICE will be going to airports to help our wonderful TSA Agents who have stayed on the job" despite the partial government shutdown. He further criticized Democrats.

Travelers at some airports worried about reaching their gates Sunday.

At Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport, lines wrapped from one end of the airport to the other.

“Everyone just seems to be accepting it for what it is, said 43-year-old Blake Wilbanks, who showed up 2 1/2 hours early for his morning flight to Salt Lake City after reading about the shutdown.

“Hopeful I’m gonna make it,” he said as he waited in a winding security line.

The scene appeared more chaotic at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York. Large big crowds of anxious travelers piled toward security checkpoints, and TSA staff shouted through megaphones to tell people not to push one another.

For Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, one concern is the uncertainty that passengers are facing over possible wait times at any airport on any given day.

“Do I have to come an hour and a half early? Do I have to come four hours early? They don’t know until the day of or the afternoon of their flight,” he said. “So if we can alleviate that, again, the president wants to take away that leverage point for Democrats and make travel easier for the American people.”

House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York said “the last thing that the American people need are for untrained ICE agents to be deployed at airports all across the country” after criticism about their conduct as part of Trump's immigration enforcement operations in Minnesota and elsewhere.

Homan appeared on CNN's “State of the Union” and “Fox News Sunday,” while Duffy was interviewed on ABC's “This Week” and Jeffries spoke on CNN.

Associated Press writers Collin Binkley in West Palm Beach, Fla., Anthony Izaguirre in Lindenhurst, N.Y., Yuki Iwamura in New York and Nicholas Riccardi in Denver contributed to this report.

People wait in a TSA line at the John F. Kennedy International Airport, Sunday, March 22, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)

People wait in a TSA line at the John F. Kennedy International Airport, Sunday, March 22, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)

People wait in a TSA line at the John F. Kennedy International Airport, Sunday, March 22, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)

People wait in a TSA line at the John F. Kennedy International Airport, Sunday, March 22, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)

People wait in a TSA line at the John F. Kennedy International Airport, Sunday, March 22, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)