Lindsey Vonn’s father tells the AP he wants her to retire after her Olympic crash

CORTINA D'AMPEZZO, Italy (AP) — Lindsey Vonn’s father said Monday that the American superstar will no longer race if he has any influence over her decision and that she will not return to the Winter Olympics after breaking her left leg in the downhill over the weekend.

“She’s 41 years old and this is the end of her career,” Alan Kildow said in a telephone interview with The Associated Press. “There will be no more ski races for Lindsey Vonn, as long as I have anything to say about it.”

Kildow and the rest of Vonn’s family — a brother and two sisters — have been with Vonn while she is being treated at a hospital in Treviso following her fall and helicopter evacuation from the course in Cortina on Sunday.

Vonn said late Monday on Instagram that she had sustained a “complex tibia fracture that is currently stable but will require multiple surgeries to fix properly."

Kildow declined to comment on the injuries, but he did address how Vonn was doing emotionally.

“She’s a very strong individual,” Kildow said. “She knows physical pain and she understands the circumstances that she finds herself in. And she’s able to handle it. Better than I expected. She’s a very, very strong person. And so I think she’s handling it real well.”

Kildow — a former ski racer himself who taught his daughter to race — said he slept in his daughter’s hospital room overnight.

“She has somebody with her — or multiple people with her — at all times,” Kildow said. “We’ll have people here as long as she’s here.”

Kildow and the rest of Vonn’s family watched the crash from the finish area with all of the other spectators.

“First, the shock and the horror of the whole thing, seeing a crash like that,” Kildow said of what he felt watching the scene unfold. “It can be dramatic and traumatic. You’re just horrified at what those kinds of impacts have.

“You can go into a shock an emotional psychological shock,” he added. “Because it’s difficult to just accept what’s happened. But she’s well cared for. … And the USOC and the U.S. Ski team have a very, very top-notch doctor with her and she is being very well cared for here in Italy.”

Vonn raced the downhill despite tearing the ACL in her left knee nine days earlier in another crash.

“What happened to her had nothing to do with the ACL issue on her left leg. Nothing,” Kildow said. “She had demonstrated that she was able to function at a very high level with the two downhill training runs. … And she had been cleared by high level physicians to ski.”

Kildow said the crash was less a result of Vonn’s knee injury than the way she pushed the limits of her racing line to the point where she clipped a gate early in her run and got knocked out of control.

“There are times sometimes in any race, but especially in downhill, where you have to take a little speed off,” he said. “You can give yourself a little bit more leeway on the line so you don’t put yourself in a questionable position.”

Vonn, who holds the record of 12 World Cup victories in Cortina, returned to the circuit last season after nearly six years of retirement and after a partial titanium replacement surgery in her right knee. She won two downhills and finished on the podium in seven of the eight World Cup races that she finished this season — and came fourth in the other one.

“She won 84 World Cup races. And not many people do that,” Kildow said, referring to Vonn’s victory total, which place her second on the all-time women’s list behind teammate Mikaela Shiffrin’s record 108 wins.

“And there’s a hell of a lot of the difference between a speed race, a downhill especially, and a slalom,” Kildow added.

Vonn will not return to the Olympics to cheer on teammates or for anything else, Kildow said.

“No, she’s not that in kind of situation,” he said. “She will be going home at an appropriate point in time.”

AP Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/milan-cortina-2026-winter-olympics

United States' Lindsey Vonn's father Alan Kildow is interviewed ahead of an alpine ski women's downhill race, at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy, Sunday, Feb. 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Andrew Dampf)

United States' Lindsey Vonn crashes during an alpine ski women's downhill race, at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy, Sunday, Feb. 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

FILE - United States' Lindsey Vonn poses with her career medals with her father Alan Kildow, in the finish area after the women's downhill race, at the alpine ski World Championships in Are, Sweden, Sunday, Feb. 10, 2019. (AP Photo/Marco Trovati, File)

United States' Lindsey Vonn is airlifted away after a crash during an alpine ski women's downhill race, at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy, Sunday, Feb. 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

Police officers stand at the doors of a buildin in Ca' Foncello Hospital in Treviso, Italy, Sunday, Feb. 8, 2026, where U.S. skier Lindsey Vonn is hospitalized with a broken leg after crashing during the women's downhill competition at the Milan-Cortina Olympics. (Paola Garbuio/LaPresse via AP)

FILE - United States' Lindsey Vonn, right, poses for photographs with her father Alan Kildow at the end of an alpine ski, women's World Cup downhill race, in Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy, Friday, Jan. 16, 2015. (AP Photo/Andrew Dampf, File)

NEW YORK (AP) — The early Bird had to circle Yankee Stadium.

Jake Bird arrived at 8:15 a.m. Friday, more than five hours before the start of his first game in pinstripes. The gate where New York Yankees players usually enter wasn't yet open and he was told to enter from the other side of the ballpark, at Gate 6.

“I just walked around,” the relief pitcher said. "It was a nice foggy morning.”

Eight months after the Yankees acquired him from Colorado, Bird pitched in the Bronx for the first time Friday. He struck out two in a perfect seventh inning of an 8-2 win over the Miami Marlins in New York's home opener.

Bird credited Natalie Girard for recommending he account for possibly congested streets when he called for Uber pickup at his Manhattan hotel.

“My girlfriend is really familiar with New York, so she was kind of telling me, `Hey, there might be traffic in the morning, so you should get there early,'” Bird recalled. “Also, I didn’t really know where to enter the stadium and stuff and I’ve been in that spot before where I kind of got lost, so just it didn’t hurt to get here a little early and kind of familiarize myself with the place.”

Hours later, he entered with a 5-2 lead in the seventh inning. Bird retired Otto Lopez on a flyout, threw a called third strike past Owen Caissie and struck out Connor Norby.

Bird pumped both arms and screamed.

“He had a little emotional release after getting that third out,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. “He was, again, really sharp, man, and went right through the middle of their order. Right, left, left was efficient.”

Bird was dealt by the Rockies for a pair of prospects last July 31, made three relief appearances on the road, the last in Texas ending with Josh Jung's three-run, walk-off homer, and was sent to Triple-A for the rest of the season.

“I know last year it didn’t really work out the way he wanted,” Yankees captain Aaron Judge said, “He’s a guy that wants to be here. He wants to be great and I think after going through last year he knows the expectations now and he’s ready to go.”

Bird has allowed one hit over 4 1/3 scoreless innings in four games this season, striking out five and walking none.

“I’m just trying to stay closed and not fly open,” he said. “I know my slider and my breaking balls have been really good and fastball is a weak point at times, so just trying to build on the breaking balls as a strength and trying to improve the fastball, as well.”

An economics major at UCLA, Bird was taken by the Rockies on the fifth round of the 2018 amateur draft and made his big league debut in 2022. He has a 4.68 ERA with 221 strikeouts in 236 2/3 innings.

“Opening day is amazing," he said, “experience it here for the first time was really cool.”

AP MLB: https://apnews.com/mlb

New York Yankees' pitcher Jake Bird walks back to dugout during the sixth inning of a home-opener baseball game against the Miami Marlins, Friday, April 3, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura)