The 30-year-old said she had hinted to boyfriend Connor Watkins that she would love an Olympic proposal
AP Photo/Andy Wong
Breezy Johnson is bringing home plenty of hardware from the Olympics!
Five days after the alpine skier won gold in the women's downhill, Johnson, 30, got engaged to her boyfriend Connor Watkins in front of the crowds at the finish line of her final race.
A few minutes after competing in the women's Super-G, where she unfortunately crashed and couldn't finish the race, Watkins got down on one knee in the snow and pulled out a ring, and a Taylor Swift quote etched in wood.
A tearful Johnson said yes, as they hugged to cheers from the crowd. She later showed off the ring, featuring a curving band and a blue gem, and the quote — "Honestly, who are we to fight the alchemy," from Swift's song "The Alchemy."
AP Photo/Andy Wong
Watkins told NBC that he had been planning out his proposal for a year, and was "really hoping that I could get in the finish area and do it the way I wanted. And it turned out we could, and we're just super excited." He added that the moment had "gone above and beyond our wildest imagination."
Johnson, for her part, admitted that she "may have told him that I just always kind of had the dream of getting engaged at the Olympics."
"I mean, that was my hope!" she said. "But it's definitely a lot more crazy with everything just happening all at once, and the reality of it is so different than the way you imagined, and so much better."
Watkins and Johnson said they planned to spend the rest of the day celebrating their engagement with friends and family in Cortina, before traveling to Livigno, where snowboarding, moguls and men's alpine skiing is taking place, to watch more of the 2026 Games.
Johnson had a big Olympics, winning gold on Sunday after a crash on the exact same course had kept her from competing in the 2022 Beijing Games. This was her comeback, and she followed it up with a first place finish in the team combined event on Tuesday — which unfortunately ended just off the podium after her partner Mikaela Shiffrin struggled in her half of the event.
Still, Johnson is loving the Games — and her newly-engaged love.
"There's nothing better than doing well and having somebody to share it with," she said.
To learn more about all the Olympic and Paralympic hopefuls, come to people.com to check out ongoing coverage before, during and after the games. Watch the Milan Cortina Olympics and Paralympics, beginning Feb. 6, on NBC and Peacock.
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