Celebrated alpine skier Lindsey Vonn won’t be on the Sochi slopes this February for the winter Olympics, but that doesn’t mean there won’t be reasons to tune in. Rivalries and comebacks will surface and athletes and events will debut. In the skiing superstar’s absence, who will carve their way to the center stage in Sochi?
Vonn started off the year downhill, withdrawing from the 2014 Winter Olympics on Jan. 7 after reinjuring her knee. The 29-year-old has kept fans on their toes with the variable status of her injured knee, which she initially marred at the World Championships last February.
Vonn’s 59 World Cup victories, three Olympic appearances and one high-profile romance with Tiger Woods have cemented her popularity, but also overshadowed her American teammates. Vonn may be the face of women in winter sports, but there are other talented contenders on the face of the mountain.
Among them is alpine ski racer and two-time Olympian Julia Mancuso. She holds the record for most Olympic medals by a female American alpine skier, one of which is a silver for the women’s downhill slalom in Vancouver where Vonn got the gold.
Newcomer Mikaela Shiffrin will also find herself in the spotlight as the reigning world champion in the slalom. Sochi is the 18-year-old’s first Olympics and she enters on a victory streak, winning the women’s World Cup on Jan. 14.
Mogul skier Hannah Kearney is looking to defend her title as the reigning gold medalist in women’s freestyle skiing.
As for snowboarders, Jamie Anderson, 23, is a four-time Winter X Games champion. A gold-medal contender in slopestyle, she earned first place at the Olympic qualifier on Jan. 16.
The women’s snowboarding halfpipe team consists of two newbies and two veterans. Kaitlyn Farrington, 24, and Arielle Gold, 17, will ride in their first Olympics. With the help of Hannah Teter, the 2006 gold medalist and 2010 silver medalist, and Kelly Clark, the 2002 gold medalist, the halfpipe podium in Sochi could be all-American.
But maybe it’s what, not who that will be Sochi’s main attraction. Twelve new events premiere—three mixed, four men’s and five women’s sports—as the 2014 Olympic torch burns.
The first to debut is men’s and women’s slopestyle for snowboarding and skiing, where athletes are judged on the difficulty and variety of their tricks on a course with rails and jumps.
Broadening the spectrum of on-mountain events, Sochi also introduces the men’s and women’s ski halfpipe and the men’s and women’s parallel snowboard slalom.
Men’s ski jumping has long been around, but female ski jumpers, including three-time national champion Jessica Jerome and former world champion Lindsey Van (not to be confused with Lindsey Vonn), will finally compete.
While figure skating itself is not new to the Olympics, the sport has been expanded as a mixed team event. One male skater, one female, one skating pair, and one ice dance couple form a team that combines the points from their performances.
Another sport spreading into mixed territory is the biathlon. Two women will each complete 6km followed by two men who will each finish the remaining two 7.5km.
Finally, luge has incorporated a new event: mixed luge team relay. The combined times of one men’s slide, one double and one women’s slide will determine the winner.
Athletes may be skiing downhill, but they’ve succeeded in their uphill battle to include more events. Allowing competitors to live their pipe dreams on the halfpipe (or track or ice or slope) makes the 2014 Winter Olympics truly cutting-edge.
Image from: nydailynews.com