No stopping golden girl Vonn (News Feature)

By David Hein Feb 17, 2010, 21:44 GMT

Whistler, Canada - A week ago, Lindsey Vonn appeared close to tears as she told the world's media her Olympic hopes might be over as the result of a bad shin injury in training.

On Wednesday, there was no holding them back when she finally fulfilled her dream of an Olympic gold by winning the women's downhill.

Vonn was a bundle of emotions on the finishing line when skier after skier came to congratulate her even before the race was over.

She had not just won, she had demolished the field.

It is what she has been doing all season on the World Cup circuit, winning five of the six downhill races so far.

Only Germany's Maria Riesch had broken the series, in the very last downhill before the Olympics. But when Riesch - Vonn's close friend - was more than two seconds behind, it was clear the coveted gold medal belonged to the 25-year-old American.

'This is everything I've wanted and hoped for,' Vonn said in first television interviews.

'It was not the perfect run by any means, but I attacked and made it down. It's awesome.'

Vonn had been unable to train for a week since injuring her right shin in Austria. It was, she said, 'definitely the most painful injury I have ever had.'.

But adverse weather conditions at Whistler played into her hand, with the many postponements giving her more time to recover.

Vonn is already the most successful US women's skier of all time with 31 World Cup wins and will be a medals candidate in four more disciplines at the Games.

US joy was further enhanced by Julia Mancuso's silver, a second Olympic gold for 'super Jules' after her giant slalom victory in Turin four years ago.

With Bode Miller winning bronze in the men's downhill it has been the best of starts for the US alpine ski team.

Vonn, who this season is also hoping to win a third straight overall World Cup title and could soon overtake Miller's record of 32 World Cup wins, has erased the memory of the 2006 Games when she crashed badly in downhill training.

At that Games she had to be airlifted from the San Sicario course, but after a night in a Turin hospital she returned with bad back and hip bruising to finish eighth.

'It's hard to stay positive, it's hard to focus on being prepared for the Olympics when you have such a big injury as this,' Vonn said seven days ago.

It was gloom all round. Vonn had come into the Games as America's new cover girl, on the front page of Sports Illustrated's Olympic preview issue and its annual swimsuit edition.

US broadcaster NBC has also invested heavily in a Vonn success, in the hope she could come the Michael Phelps of the Winter Olympics.

Vonn won't hear talk of that. It was just one - painful - step at a time. 'I'm Lindsey not Michael,' she said.

But now that she has her first gold anything is possible.