Lindsey Vonn’s Teeth
A letter to the editor in last week’s New York Times was written by a woman who played college ice hockey in the 1970’s at Brown University, the only women’s college ice hockey team in the U.S at the time. She relates that she encouraged her brother, a varsity hockey player at Colby College, to “get some girls out onto the ice for us to play.” He did, and one of them was their friend Linda Krohn. When Linda’s mother found out she insisted that Linda stop playing hockey so she wouldn’t lose her teeth. The letter adds: “Now I smile with glee that Linda’s daughter, Lindsey Vonn, races down mountains at world-class speeds and that women’s ice hockey is in the Olympics, too.”
And Lindsey still has her teeth! After a recent accident on the ice that left blood streaming down her face she said: “I was just confused. At the bottom I didn’t know what had happened and I was hoping I hadn’t lost any teeth. I am just glad it wasn’t anything major, just a cut.” Vonn said she wears a protective mouthguard which saved her teeth and saved a huge dental bill. Read about athletic guards at: drterryshapiro.com/mouthguards.html.
After her shin injury at the Olympics she said: “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 find it intriguing that she used the term “grit my teeth through” because when I look closely at her teeth I see signs of tooth wear – likely from gritting her teeth.
Tags: athletic guards, dentistry, mouthguards, teeth, teeth grinding
