"For years, Breezy Johnson was the other American alpine skier. The one with the near-misses, the injuries, the suspension and the unfortunate timing to exist in the same stable at the same time as Lindsey Vonn and Mikaela Shiffrin. On Sunday, three weeks after her 30th birthday in the shadow of the Dolomites above Cortina d'Ampezzo, she became an Olympic champion."
"Johnson crossed first in the women's downhill at the Milano Cortina Games by four-hundredths of a second the slightest winning margin in the event's Olympic history outside the dead heat in 2014 to become just the second American woman to win the sport's most prestigious title. The only other was Vonn, who took gold in Vancouver 16 years ago. Johnson's winning time of 1min 36.10sec held off Germany's Emma Aicher, earning the United States their first medal of these Olympics."
"Four-hundredths of a second isn't much time at all: the blink of a camera shutter, the wingbeat of a hummingbird, the duration of Muhammad Ali's phantom punch. But on a sun-splashed morning, it was enough to lift the skier from Jackson Hole, Wyoming, into winter sports immortality. The extraordinary result came in a race that took on a sudden gravity almost as quickly as it began."
"Johnson was seated in the leader's chair when Vonn attempting an audacious medal bid aged 41 with a nonexistent ACL crashed barely 13 seconds into her run and was airlifted off the mountain, leaving the race suspended and the atmosphere shaken. When the race resumed after nearly a half hour, Johnson's marker held up for 31 more racers. And when the last of them was done, so was something else: the long, winding arc of a career that has rarely followed a straight line."
Breezy Johnson, three weeks after turning 30, won the women's downhill at Milano Cortina with a time of 1:36.10, beating Germany's Emma Aicher by four-hundredths of a second. The victory made Johnson the second American woman to win Olympic downhill after Lindsey Vonn and delivered the United States' first medal of these Games. The race was suspended after Lindsey Vonn crashed early and was airlifted from the mountain; when competition resumed nearly half an hour later, Johnson's time held against 31 subsequent racers. Johnson's career has included near-misses, injuries, a suspension and long-standing overshadowing by superstar teammates.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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