The winter Olympics is upon us and, if you’re anything like me, you’re suddenly finding yourself becoming a fan of sports you normally don’t think too much about.
One of those sports and one of the big stories has been women’s alpine skiing and Lindsey Vonn.
You probably know the story by now. Vonn has been making a comeback, returning from retirement to once again become one of the best alpine skiers in the world, if not the best. Then, tragedy struck shortly before the Olympics and she tore her ACL. She decided to race at the Olympics on a completely torn ACL. From what I’ve heard, this is possible to do in skiing but very difficult. As one of the best skiers in the world, if not one of the best in history, she would be more capable of doing this than almost anyone in the world.
However, there was a fair bit of criticism. People saying she should give up her spot to someone who is more healthy. People saying she shouldn’t risk greater damage to her knee by skiing through this injury. But she went. Unfortunately, she suffered another setback when her arm hooked a gate at high speed, spinning her out of control and leaving her with a pretty bad tibia fracture.
Of course, this is the internet so everyone has their opinion. However, she had two very good practice runs and the torn ACL seems to have little to nothing to do with catching a gate. She knew what she was getting into and took a calculated risk. This time it didn’t work out so, with hindsight, it’s easy to say it was a bad decision.
But was it? And what does this have to do with our running?
Well, my understanding is that she was planning to retire after the Olympics. So this was it for her. The last race of her life. She had nothing to save herself for. If you think you can go and you earned the right to go, why not?
In our running, sometimes we have to make similar decisions. The large majority of the time, I’d be a strong advocate for protecting your health. However, there are definitely circumstances where the reward is worth the risk. Not many of us will find ourselves in Lindsey Vonn’s situation and there is no easy questionnaire to fill out that will tell you what you should do. However, if you think of your values and what matters to you in your running life, you can usually answer whether the reward is worth the risk.
Be honest with yourself, make the decision, then commit to the decision.