Olympic Cheese Remedy

CNN provides a variety of news stories, and they did not disappoint with the latest Olympic news: Skier spreads cheese on leg to heal injury. Lindsay Vonn, an Olympic hopeful from the United States, injured her shin while training in Austria. As others before her have done, Lindsay has chosen an unorthodox method to help maximize her healing. She is spreading her shin with cheese. Not just any old cheese, it is a special Austrian cheese called topfen, that is hopefully going to reduce inflammation. Other Olympic hopefuls have tried other methods to ease injuries including castor oil and lard in plastic wrap.

I was impressed with their tactics, it takes someone really creative to think of cheese as an anti-inflammatory agent. Old wives tales have been around probably as long as regular wives have, so there is probably a laundry list of remedies she could try to relieve pressure and swelling. One of the main points the article makes is that it may be the placebo effect that can help Lindsay heal faster, by using her positive thoughts to basically override the brain into thinking the injury is healed when in fact it is not. If it works, we could have another few medals for the Americans this Olympic season.

A great thing I think this story contributes is the possible popularity of the topfen after it's use as a possible healing agent has been publicised. According to Norbert Wabnig, a native Austrian and founder of The Cheese Store, of Beverly Hills, the cheese is not popular with customers. If people want to try this cheese and it helps bring some business to his store, or to Austrians in general then that is pretty cool.

All in all it was a pretty cheesy article, but I think that was the aim and they definitely found their mark.