Freestyle skier Sarah Burke died yesterday after suffering massive internal injuries in a practice crash on January 10 in Utah. Burke, a multi-time X-Games champion, had also lobbied successfully to get superpipe accepted into the Olympics (where it will debut in Russia in two years). She leaves behind a husband, Rory Bushfield (also a freestyler), and countless mourning fans across the globe.
This young woman was just 29 years old, which makes her death even tougher to swallow. We often tend to view sports heroes as superhuman, but incidents like these are stark reminders of just how vulnerable they really are. RIP, Sarah.