Olympics Notebook: Vancouver 2010

Lindsey Vonn has re-connected with her huge online following — which I, for one, am determined to call her Digital Vonn-tourage — and put a brief dalliance with old media behind her.

Vonn, the 25-year-old Alpine skiing world champion and Face of the Games, turned to a major U.S. TV network and a traditional IOC press conference to break the news on Wednesday that she had a badly bruised shin that might keep her out of the Olympics.

TV? A press conference? How old-fashioned, Lindsey. How very binary!

For a while it looked like she might be doing a Stephen Fry and bidding farewell to the Twittering game.  Remember, Vonn had originally said she would be ceasing her social media activities during the Games after getting confused about what IOC rules permitted.

The IOC stepped in to reassure her that she was perfectly fine to carry on as usual but her heart seemed to have gone out of it for a while there, with “Just landed in Vancouver yay!” about as interesting as it got for a week or so.

She apologised to her followers for not being more digitally forthcoming and on Thursday she was back in a much more social mood.

First up was Twitter, where she informed fans that she had taken painkillers prior to a training run that had to be cancelled because of the weather. Then in the afternoon she proved she is back in digital spirits with a lengthy Facebook post, complete with kisses and hugs at the end.

“I was really happy to be back on snow today even if it was for only 1 freeski run. My shin was still very painful, but I feel like the injury is finally progressing a bit. The pain level has gone down from a sharp debilitating pain to something that I feel I may be able to grit my teeth through. So that really puts a smile on my face!:) I won’t know the full extent of what I am dealing with untill I actually get on the DH coarse. Generally I am disappointed when a training run is cancelled, but in this situation I definitely welcome the extra day to heal! And I want to say thanks so much for all the nice messages you guys have been sending! I read them everyday and they have been cheering me up a lot! XOXO LV”