SAALBACH-HINTERGLEMM, Austria — American skier Breezy Johnson won gold in the women’s downhill at the Alpine skiing world championships Saturday.
Johnson finished 0.15 seconds ahead of silver medalist Mirjam Puchner of Austria. Czech skier Ester Ledecka came 0.21 behind in third to take bronze.
The first starter, Johnson led the race from start to finish, mainly thanks to a near-perfect second half of her run, where she posted the fastest split times in three of the four sections.
Even with no competitor’s time to compare to, Johnson pumped her first when she completed her run.
“I knew I made some mistakes, but I also knew that I charged and gave everything I could,” said Johnson, 29. “So, I knew it wasn’t the perfect run but I knew it was good and then, when I came across the line and saw it was a low 41, I was like, maybe…”
It’s Johnson first medal from a major event and came two months after she returned from a 14-month ban for three “whereabouts” violations of anti-doping rules.
“I was thinking about it this morning and I was like, it’s a privilege to be able to play the game, to be able to be here,” Johnson said. “When you know that, going in, you have a little bit of freedom, because no matter what happens, you’ve got the chance to try.”
Johnson has yet to win a World Cup race. The Jackson, Wyoming native has seven podium results, but none since December 2021.
She missed the 2018-19 season with a knee injury, then sat out the 2022 Olympics with another injury.
Lindsey Vonn trailed her American teammate Johnson by 1.96 seconds in 15th.
Vonn smiled after finishing and waved and blew a kiss to the spectators, then hugged Johnson in the leader seat.
Vonn retired in 2019 after winning bronze in downhill in Are, Sweden, following several injuries, but returned to the circuit this season with a new titanium right knee.
Saturday’s race took place exactly one year before the downhill at the 2026 Milan-Cortina Olympics.
Racing in perfect sunny conditions and under crisp blue skies, the fastest skiers approached the Ulli Maier jump, key part of the course, with speeds of up to 140 kph (87 mph) and flew around 35 meters.
The course is not a regular stop on the women’s circuit, but athletes who qualified for last season World Cup finals had raced on it before. Vonn also did, in two downhills in 2002.
Many of the prerace favorites failed to live up to their billing.
Overall World Cup leader Federica Brignone, who won her first two career downhills this season, placed 10th, and her Italian teammate Sofia Goggia, the 2018 Olympic downhill champion, finished one-hundredth of a second behind Vonn in 16th, a day after she had crash but escaped injuries in the final training session.
Lara Gut-Behrami lost her balance entering a right turn, but the Swiss star avoided falling and missed the next gate, two days after she hooked a gate and finished eighth in the super-G, which Austria’s Stephanie Venier won.
