BEAVER CREEK – Early in his career, Andrew Weibrecht constantly flirted with the line between fast and foolhardy on a downhill course.

The U.S. skier took chances few even would contemplate – besides Bode Miller, of course – for the sake of more and more speed.

That aggressiveness eventually caught up to him. Since winning a surprise Olympic bronze medal four years ago in Vancouver, Weibrecht has blown out each ankle and has gone through surgeries on both shoulders. He also lost his sponsorship from the U.S. Ski Team for lackluster results.

Finally healthy – not counting a recently bruised shin – the speed specialist nicknamed “Warhorse” is ready to charge again in Beaver Creek. He’s hoping to show that he indeed deserves a spot on the team for the Sochi Games and that he possibly can be a medal contender again.

“I’ve done everything to put myself in a position to really have the best year that I can imagine,” said Weibrecht, who’s from Lake Placid, N.Y., and has his medal on display there in his family’s hotel. “I like to think that it means I can be back on the podium and be competitive in World Cup again. But I guess you never really know.”

Plenty has transpired for Weibrecht since that day in Whistler, British Columbia, when he finished behind Aksel Lund Svindal of Norway and Miller in the Olympic super-G. Some good (he got a dog), some great (he got married), some painful (those four surgeries) and some just a blow to his ego (his funding being cut).

He shrugged his surgically repaired shoulders when explaining his recent injury spell, chalking it up to simple bad luck. He had another round of it last weekend in Lake Louise, Alberta, when he fell in a race and severely bruised his shin.

“It’s really painful to be in a ski boot, especially to push through bumps,” Weibrecht said. “But I’ll be OK.”

After all, he’s no stranger to dealing with pain. Here’s a look at his medical maladies since Vancouver:

In 2010, he hurt his left ankle and right shoulder.

In 2011, the left shoulder.

In 2012, right ankle reconstruction.

In the spring of 2013, an ankle scope to clean things out.

“I keep asking for a (surgery punch card),” the 27-year-old Weibrecht said with a chuckle. “It’s been just a total pain. But it’s what happens, I guess. Most people go through it at one point or another. I was lucky for a lot of years, totally injury free, despite being really reckless.

“I kind of paid for it all at the same time. Hopefully, that’s behind me, and I feel healthy and strong.”

Those ailments led him to slip from the “A” squad to the “B” team, meaning he had to pay for parts of his travel expenses. He rounded up sponsors, though, by learning the art of writing grant proposals, which has kept him racing on the circuit.

“I can’t complain about the funding because it was relatively easy for me; I lucked out,” he said. “Hopefully, I can move forward and forget about this little bump in the road.”

Now, he’s about to step onto a course he relishes. Beaver Creek actually is where he earned his hard-charging reputation.

Six years ago, Weibrecht started at position No. 53, with the course rutted and the snow falling. He attacked it with no worry about going into the safety net, teetering on the brink of a major wipeout all the way down the slope. He charged to 10th that day, which remains one of his best performances at a World Cup event.

Weibrecht wants to bring that intensity to the course again this weekend.

And while the course has been altered – the men will be running sections of the new course built for the women in advance of the 2015 world championships – that hardly dampens his spirit.

“Should be really fun,” Weibrecht said. “Because I feel great about my skiing.”

Vonn scheduled to ski at Lake Louise

LAKE LOUISE, Alberta – Lindsey Vonn was cleared to get back on a World Cup course for downhill training, the latest step as she works to return from a right knee injury and get ready for the Sochi Olympics.

Now Vonn – and the rest of the skiing world – will wait to find out whether she’ll actually be racing by the end of this week.

The four-time overall World Cup champion and reigning Olympic downhill gold medalist is expected to start in Wednesday’s first official training session at Lake Louise, the U.S. Ski Team said Tuesday.

The team added that not until Thursday would a decision be made on whether Vonn will return to competition for the first time since tearing right knee ligaments in a high-speed crash at the world championships last February. The scheduled races at Lake Louise – a site Vonn has dominated in the past, including three-victory sweeps in 2011 and 2012 – are downhills Friday and Saturday, with a super-G on Sunday.

The U.S. Ski Team said Vonn “felt strong” after doing super-G training in her hometown of Vail last weekend, and that her surgeon, Dr. Bill Sterett, feels “her knee is stable.”

Vonn was working toward a return to racing last week at Beaver Creek until wiping out during a training run Nov. 19 and partially tearing a ligament in her surgically repaired knee.

The American told The Associated Press over the weekend that she needs another operation on her knee but is trying to put it off as long as possible in order to be able to ski at the Sochi Games, which begin in a little more than two months.

Vonn is three race wins from equaling the World Cup women’s record of 62 held by Austria’s Annemarie Moser-Proell, and she said over the weekend she was planning to travel to Canada for downhill training. Of her 59 career World Cup race victories, 14 have come at Lake Louise in the Canadian Rockies.

She is so successful – and comfortable – on this particular slope, she petitioned the International Ski Federation (FIS) in October 2012 to allow her to compete in a men’s World Cup race at Lake Louise. But FIS turned her down.

Originally, Tuesday was supposed to be the first day of downhill training, but that was called off because of travel delays from the women’s previous World Cup stop in Colorado.

World Cup Skiing notes

With the downhill training run canceled Tuesday because of travel issues with some teams, skiers such as Ted Ligety and Bode Miller squeezed in some giant slalom runs in nearby Copper Mountain. ... Because of sketchy weather forecasts, race organizers have elected to switch the downhill and super-G races. The downhill now will be Friday and the super-G on Saturday.