Katja Seizinger

Katja Seizinger

German skier
Date of Birth: 10.05.1972
Country: Germany

Biography of Katja Seizinger


Katja Seizinger is a renowned German alpine skier, a three-time Olympic champion, a world champion, and a two-time winner of the World Cup. She is the only German athlete in the history of alpine skiing to have won the World Cup twice (besides Rosie Mittermaier in 1976). Seizinger made her World Cup debut on December 10, 1989, in Steamboat Springs, USA, in the combination event. She first stepped onto the podium in a World Cup event on February 11, 1990, in Meribel, France, in the super-G discipline at the age of 17. Throughout her career, she achieved 36 victories in World Cup stages, including 16 in downhill, 16 in super-G, and 4 in giant slalom. In terms of total victories in World Cup stages, Seizinger ranks fifth in history, trailing only Annemarie Moser-Pröll (62), Vreni Schneider (55), Renate Götschl (46), and Anja Persson (40). Interestingly, in the combination event, which she won at the 1998 Nagano Olympics, Seizinger only stepped onto the podium twice in World Cup events, finishing second once and third once. Overall, Seizinger started in 202 World Cup events and stood on the podium 76 times, including 32 times in downhill, 27 times in super-G, 14 times in giant slalom, once in slalom, and twice in the combination event. In 1998, at the Nagano Olympics, Seizinger won her second consecutive Olympic gold medal in downhill, becoming the first alpine skier in history to achieve this feat in a single discipline at two consecutive Olympics. The same Olympics saw Italian skier Deborah Compagnoni accomplish the same feat in giant slalom. Among men, only Alberto Tomba (giant slalom in 1988 and 1992) and Kjetil Andre Aamodt (super-G in 2002 and 2006) have achieved this in the history of the Olympics. Seizinger retired from skiing in March 1998 at the age of 25. She won the overall World Cup title twice, in 1996 and 1998, as well as the downhill World Cup title four times (1992, 1993, 1994, 1998) and the super-G World Cup title five times (a record among both men and women) in 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, and 1998.

Katja Seizinger

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