448: Why Lindsey Vonn’s Comeback Wasn’t a Failure

Why Lindsey Vonn’s Comeback Was Not a Failure (A Masterclass in Resilience)

The Olympics are here! Woohoo! 

If you’ve been listening to the Real Life Runners podcast for any amount of time, you already know this about us: we love the Olympics.

Not just because they’re exciting (they are), but because the Olympics are basically a giant spotlight on the human experience—pressure, identity, resilience, setbacks, comebacks—and what happens when you choose to step into the arena anyway.

Which brings us to the biggest story of the week so far: Lindsey Vonn.

Today I want to talk about why her comeback was absolutely not a failure, and what her story teaches us as real life runners.

The Comeback Everyone Was Watching

Lindsey Vonn is one of the greatest downhill skiers of all time. She dominated her sport for years, and she did it in a sport that’s honestly bonkers. Downhill skiing isn’t a “mistakes happen” kind of event. It’s flying down a mountain at insane speeds on blades strapped to your feet and trusting your body, your timing, and your courage, at a level most of us can’t even imagine.

She retired years ago, and then decided to come back in her 40s.

As humans, we love a good comeback story. She was suddenly the golden child again, and the media was loving it.

A week before the Olympics, Lindsey crashed and seriously injured her knee, including a full ACL rupture, meniscus injuries, and bone bruising. 

Instead of pulling out, after talking to her doctors and her medical team, she made the call to still compete.

That’s when the internet shifted. Suddenly, everyone became an orthopedic surgeon. Everyone had an opinion. People called her selfish. People said she should give up her spot (which wasn’t even a thing). People decided they knew better than the person who has spent her entire life on the mountain, in her body, with her own medical team.

Then she went out and did a training run on the Olympic course and posted one of the fastest times.

It was looking good! We were going to get our comeback story…

And then, on race day, she clipped a gate with her shoulder and crashed again. She fractured her leg and ended up needing surgery that same day.

Damn.

Of course, the internet did what it does best: “See? I told you so.” “This comeback was a failure.”

But that’s not what we see.

We see a masterclass in strength, identity, resilience, and not giving an F about what other people think.

And there’s so much we can learn from that.

Why Are We So Obsessed With Outcomes?

We’re conditioned to measure worth by results. Podiums, PRs, rankings, medals. Those are labeled as success, and so often we treat everything else like it was wasted time, wasted effort, a “failure.”

Runners do this to themselves constantly.

I hear things like: 

If I didn’t PR, the race was pointless. 

If I had to walk, I failed. 

If I didn’t hit my goal pace, the training didn’t work. 

If the outcome wasn’t what I wanted, then it must mean I’m doing it wrong.

But what if outcomes didn’t have to be a verdict?

What if they were simply information?

Data you can learn from. Feedback that helps you adjust. A snapshot of one moment in a much bigger story.

Because the second we slap the label “failure” on something, we stop seeing nuance. We stop seeing growth. We stop seeing the part that actually matters.

And the more we judge other people as success or failure, the more our brain learns to judge ourselves the same way. 

That’s not resilience. 

That’s fear disguised as certainty.

What Resilience Actually Looks Like

A lot of people think resilience means “bouncing back.” 

You fall, you get up, and you return to the same version of yourself.

But that’s not what resilience looks like in real life.

Real resilience is being willing to evolve and still show up.

It’s choosing to step into the arena knowing there are no guarantees, and being willing to risk discomfort, judgment, and even disappointment.

Lindsey has been injured over and over throughout her career. She’s come back more times than most people would even try. But this comeback wasn’t just about that final week. It started the moment she decided to come out of retirement knowing she might not look like her old self, knowing she might get criticized, knowing she might not qualify, knowing she might not medal.

And she did it anyway.

That willingness alone is resilience.

The Journey Is the Point

Lindsey’s story is decades long. She’s been competing at the highest level for more than half of her life. She has a relationship with her sport that started when she was a child. 

This wasn’t about one medal. It was about devotion to the craft, love of the sport, and the courage to chase something that mattered to her.

I think this is the reminder we all need as runners.

Most of being a runner isn’t crossing finish lines. Most of being a runner is training. 

It’s consistency. It’s the mundane. It’s the strength work. It’s the early mornings. It’s the days you don’t feel like doing it and you do it anyway because you’re becoming someone in the process.

If the only thing that mattered was the finish line, most of your life wouldn’t count. Most of motherhood wouldn’t count. Most of marriage wouldn’t count. Most of your personal growth wouldn’t count.

Because most of life is the middle.

So… Was This a Failure?

Not even close.

Lindsey honored her desire. She chose courage over comfort, and she trained and competed without guarantees. She modeled what it looks like to try without certainty. 

Whether she intended to or not, she expanded what feels possible for other people watching.

That matters.

Failure isn’t trying and coming up short.

Failure is letting fear decide for you. It’s not even being willing to try.

Failure is never stepping into the arena at all.

That’s not what Lindsey did, not even close. 

She put it all out there, and unfortunately, it didn’t end well. She didn’t hit the podium, or even make it down the mountain and complete her Olympic run.

But in my opinion, she’s still a champion, simply because she chose to go for it.

What About Your Journey?

I’d invite you to use Lindsey’s example, and answer a few questions to see where you might have some potential areas of growth:

Where are you calling something a failure that might actually be growth?

What journey are you downplaying because the outcome wasn’t perfect?

What would change if you trusted the process more than the result?

Results are never guaranteed. Not in running, not in business, not in relationships, not in life.

So the real question is: are you willing to show up anyway?

If you’re in a season that doesn’t look the way you hoped, I want you to hear me: keep going. Sometimes you’re doing the right things—you just got the timeline wrong. And sometimes you walk far enough down the path to realize you want something different. Either way, that’s not failure. That’s wisdom.

Your story isn’t over.

Want Support on Your Journey?

Inside the Real Life Runners Team, we coach the physical training and the mindset that helps you actually follow through—especially when outcomes aren’t guaranteed.

If you want support, we’d love to help you. Head to realliferunners.com/team to learn more.

And if this message hit, go listen to the full podcast episode and share it with a runner who needs the reminder: this is not a failure. This is growth.