Lindsey Vonn is addressing the haters… again.

“It wasn’t all for nothing… it wasn’t a dream… although sitting in this hospital bed it seems far away now…,” Vonn, 41, wrote via Instagram on Saturday, February 21, defending her decision to compete in the 2026 Winter Olympics despite tearing her ACL nine days earlier.

“But I did it. I came back. I won,” she continued in the caption, shared alongside a highlight video of her recent races. “I showed up and did what most thought was impossible at my age with a partial knee replacement. These memories I’ll have forever and I’m grateful for every one of them. Every moment was amazing. Every moment was worth it.”

After tearing her ACL in a World Cup competition on January 30, Vonn decided to compete in the Olympics despite the athlete publicly confirming the ligament was “100 percent gone.”

Just 13 seconds into her first run of the Games on February 8, she broke her left tibia after clipping a flag and crashing out. She was airlifted off the course in Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy, and transported to a nearby hospital where she underwent four surgeries.

She returned to the United States on Tuesday, February 17, and underwent several additional surgeries.

Critics jumped on Vonn after the second injury, with some claiming she should not have competed in the Olympics after tearing her ACL and, instead, let someone else compete in her spot.

Vonn is having none of that, listing out her achievements in Saturday’s Instagram post.

“One thing that stung was when people said I was selfish and should give my Olympic spot to someone else,” she said in the post. “So… I just wanted to recap my season for all the haters out there that don’t understand what it means to earn your spot, and on a more positive note, to just reflect… #1 in the downhill standings; 3rd in sg standings; 2x Downhill wins; On every downhill podium all season; 7/8 podiums overall (only one 4th place).”

She continued, “It’s not impossible until it’s done. I didn’t reach my ultimate goal…. But I still did a lot. Thank you to those who believed! ❤️🙏🏻 #BELV.”

Vonn previously defended herself on social media after several people were questioning the extent of her ACL injury, even before breaking her leg at the Olympics.

“lol thanks doc,” Vonn posted via X on February 7, in response to a sports medicine doctor who was questioning the state of her injury. “My ACL was fully functioning until last Friday. Just because it seems impossible to you doesn’t mean it’s not possible. And yes, my ACL is 100% ruptured. Not 80% or 50%. It’s 100% gone.”

On Friday, Vonn shared a new photo of her broken leg, an x-ray showing what looks like a medal stabilizing brace on her bone.

“As you can see, it required a lot of plates and screws to put back together but Dr. Hackett did an incredible job,” Vonn posted via Instagram on Friday, along with a carousel of videos of her in the hospital with the x-ray photos. “Thank you Dr. Viola for the surgery assist as well!”

She acknowledged the struggle of her long recovery, saying she has not been on her feet in over a week.

Through it all, she claims her second, more grueling, injury had nothing to do with her original ACL tear.

“I was simply 5 inches too tight on my line when my right arm hooked inside of the gate, twisting me and resulted in my crash,” she shared via Instagram after the crash. “My ACL and past injuries had nothing to do with my crash whatsoever.”

As far as genre fiction legends are concerned, William Shatner is near the top for his part as Captain James T. Kirk in the original Star Trek series. However, in the decades following his time as Kirk (a role that would define his entire career), Shatner pivoted from the far future to the (relatively) recent past for How the West Was Won. No, not the theatrically-released feature film that featured John Wayne, James Stewart, and Henry Fonda. We’re talking about the three-season television drama headlined by Gunsmoke star James Arness. And boy, did Shatner deliver in this harrowing Western tale.

William Shatner Stands Out In This Fabulous Performance on ‘How the West Was Won’

Appearing in the second season of the underrated three-season Western drama, Shatner shows up briefly at the end of “Orville Gant” as Captain Robert Harrison. However, it’s his performance in the following episode, “Amnesty,” that is especially of note. After mountain man Zeb Macahan (Arness) saves Beth Harrison (Vera Miles of Psycho fame), an old flame of his from decades earlier, he follows her to her secluded mountain home, where he encounters the old Union captain. As it turns out, Harrison, who had been presumed dead by the army after a Native American massacre, was blinded as a result of a battle against the group of warriors who had kidnapped Beth. As a result, Harrison has become somewhat suicidal, wishing to die or for Beth to leave him, despite her remaining faithful in the 20 years since.

Shatner is genuinely powerful here, showing off his dramatic acting chops and reminding audiences that he can play the serious part just as well (and perhaps even better than) his more pulp-inspired characters. The moment he recalls the battle that resulted in his blindness, there’s an intense shift in the way Shatner presents himself. His stone-cold demeanor captivates the viewer, and even the sound design changes so that we spiral into the captain’s uneasy headspace, hearing the horrors of war that he recalls every day of his life. It’s a brilliant technique that adds to the depth of his words as he meditates on the incident that has driven him nearly to madness and informed his life for the last two decades since. What Shatner is able to do here with this powerful monologue is indeed fantastic. “You know, the more I’m around you, Captain, the less I like you,” Zeb tells him the moment they meet, but Harrison feels the opposite.

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While the Star Trek icon may not be traditionally associated with the Western genre (though the franchise certainly delved into Old West territory, and no wonder, as Gene Roddenberry wrote for Have Gun — Will Travel before creating Star Trek), this is one performance that stands out among the rest of his filmography. It reminds us that there has always been more to Shatner than his work in the science fiction genre, be it as Captain Kirk or in The Twilight Zone. As Captain Harrison, Shatner dove deeper into the psychological recesses of the American frontier, highlighting some of the most uncomfortable aspects of westward expansion while exploring the deep-seated issues of a man who has failed to let go of his last battle.

‘How the West Was Won’ Was Notable For Its Impressive Guest Stars

After launching with a made-for-TV feature titled The Macahans, How the West Was Won was picked up as an official series by ABC soon after Gunsmoke came to a close. In that time, the Western epic pulled in plenty of big names for guest stints in its 28 separate 90-minute episodes. From classical Western TV stars like Lloyd Bridges of The Loner fame and Jack Elam of The Dakotas to other big stars like Christopher Lee and Michael Conrad from Hill Street Blues. While William Shatner was one of the biggest of these names (barring Lee, of course, who played a visiting Russian politician), there was never any shortage of recognizable faces on the late ’70s Western program. For goodness’ sake, Tron legend Bruce Boxleitner was one of its leading stars, as was Fionnula Flanagan in the second and third seasons.

Although not a man known for venturing too often into Western territory — save for movies like White Comanche and some guest appearances on Gunsmoke, The Virginian, and The Big Valley — William Shatner proved his ability within the genre here on How the West Was Won. Without even leaving the confines of his hidden cabin home, Shatner’s Captain Harrison made such an impact on the series in his brief 20-minutes of screentime that he’s still talked about by fans all these years later.

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