Lindsey Vonn finally leaves hospital after Winter Olympics horror crash and reveals how doctor ‘saved her leg’ from amputation
Lindsey Vonn has finally left hospital after her horrific leg break but the American skiing great has a very long road to recovery ahead of her.
In a lengthy post to Instagram on Monday morning, the 41-year-old revealed the devastating extent of her injuries and that doctors saved her from losing her leg after crashing at the Winter Olympics in Italy.
Vonn said she is in a wheelchair and will be for the foreseeable future. She fought back tears at times in a video where she explained how much pain she has already had to overcome.
‘I had a complex tibia fracture, I also fractured my fibia head and the reason it was so complex was because I had compartment syndrome,’ Vonn explained. ‘Compartment syndrome is when you have so much trauma to one area that there is too much blood and it gets stuck. It basically crushes everything – muscles, nerves, tendons, it dies.
‘Dr Tom Hackett saved my leg from being amputated. He did what is called a fasciotomy, he cut open both sides of my leg and let it breathe and he saved me.
‘It will take around a year for all of the bones to heal and then I will decide if I want to take out all the metal or not, and then go back into surgery and finally fix my ACL. Life is life, we have to take the punches as they come.’
Lindsey Vonn is out of hospital but is only at the start of her recovery from a broken leg
Vonn, 41, says she is immobile and in a wheelchair while her leg begins to heal
Vonn tore her ACL in a crash before the Winter Olympics, something she said was actually a good thing because if that hadn’t happened, Dr Hackett would not have been on hand to help her.
‘If I hadn’t torn my ACL, which I would have done anyways in this crash, Doctor Tom Hackett wouldn’t have been there,’ Vonn said. ‘He wouldn’t have been able to save my leg.
‘He saved my leg from being amputated. I always talk about everything happening for a reason… I feel very lucky and grateful for him, for this six-hour surgery.’
Vonn revealed she also broke her ankle in the crash and that she needed a vital blood transfusion after one of her fifth surgery to combat low haemoglobin.
‘I was in the hospital a little longer than I hoped because I had very low haemogloin from the blood loss from all the surgeries,’ Vonn added. ‘I was really struggling, the pain was a little bit out of control and I had to have a blood transfusion.
‘That helped me a lot and I turned the corner and now I am out. I am in a wheelchar right now, I am very much immobile and I will be in a wheelchair for a while because I also broke my right ankle.
‘I hope I can be on crutches in a little bit but we will see.’
Vonn crashed during the women’s downhill final on February 8 and was airlifted to hospital by helicopter.
Lindsey Vonn has undergone five surgeries since hurting her leg at the Winter Olympics
Remarkably, Vonn once again insisted that she has no regrets over her comeback
Vonn added as a caption to her video: ‘I hope I explained my injury well enough. I’m not a doctor so if I don’t explain something perfectly please forgive me.
‘When the injury happened the situation was quite challenging in many ways but in the end, the situation was brought back into control. Again, thank you Dr Tom Hackett.
‘It will be a long road but I’ll get there. At least I’m out of the hospital. Love you all.’
Last week, Vonn shared an astonishing X-ray showing dozens of metal pins placed inside her leg to hold it together.
‘I’m bionic for real now,’ she joked.
Vonn’s race-torn body already contained titanium implants after she underwent a reconstruction in her right knee back in 2024.
She launched her second career comeback shortly after the reconstruction, ending a five-year retirement, which reaped its reward in the form of victory at the 2025-2026 FIS Alpine Ski World Cup in December.
The 41-year-old shared an X-ray of her surgically-repaired leg to social media on Friday
Medical crews arrived to tend to Vonn after she remained down on the piste
Vonn looked to add to that win with a gold at the Winter Olympics but disaster struck just one week before the Games began when she tore her ACL in a crash at Crans-Montana in Switzerland.
Despite clear medical concerns, Vonn attempted to compete on the torn ligament at the Games but crashed just 13 seconds into her downhill final run.
She lost control over the opening traverse after cutting the line too tight and clipping the gate and was spun around in the air.
Vonn was heard screaming after the crash as she was surrounded by medical personnel before she was strapped to a gurney and flown away.