The Women's

downhill Downhill may refer to: Arts and entertainment * ''Downhill'' (1927 film), a British film by Alfred Hitchcock * ''Downhill'' (2014 film), a British comedy directed by James Rouse * ''Downhill'' (2016 film), a Chilean thriller directed by Patrici ...

competition of the Squaw Valley 1960 Olympics was held at Squaw Valley on Saturday, February 20. The defending

world champion A world championship is generally an international competition open to elite competitors from around the world, representing their nations, and winning such an event will be considered the highest or near highest achievement in the sport, game, ...

was

Lucille Wheeler Lucile Wheeler, (born January 14, 1935) is a former alpine ski racer from Canada. She was a double world champion in 1958, the first North American to win a world title in the downhill event. Early years Wheeler was born in Quebec and grew u ...

of Canada, who had retired the previous year; defending Olympic champion Madeleine Berthod of Switzerland did not compete in this event. Nineteen-year-old Heidi Biebl of

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

won the gold medal, while American

Penny Pitou Penelope Theresa "Penny" Pitou (born October 8, 1938) is a former United States Olympic alpine skier, who in 1960 became the first American skier to win a medal in the Olympic downhill event. In 2001, Pitou was inducted into the New England Wome ...

was a second behind for the silver; the bronze medalist was

Traudl Hecher Waltraud J. "Traudl" Hecher-Görgl (28 September 1943 – 10 January 2023) was an Austrian World Cup alpine ski racer and Olympic medalist. Hecher won Olympic bronze medals in the downhill in 1960 at Squaw Valley

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

. The race was run on KT-22, with a starting

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of above

sea level Mean sea level (MSL, often shortened to sea level) is an average surface level of one or more among Earth's coastal bodies of water from which heights such as elevation may be measured. The global MSL is a type of vertical datuma standardise ...

; the course length was , with a vertical drop of . Biebl's winning time of 97.6 seconds yielded an average speed of , with an average vertical descent rate of .

Helmets

This was the first Olympic downhill in which crash helmets were mandatory, following the race death in 1959 of Canadian John Semmelink at

Garmisch Garmisch-Partenkirchen (; Bavarian: ''Garmasch-Partakurch''), nicknamed Ga-Pa, is an Alpine ski town in Bavaria, southern Germany. It is the seat of government of the district of Garmisch-Partenkirchen (abbreviated ''GAP''), in the Ob ...

West Germany West Germany is the colloquial term used to indicate the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: Bundesrepublik Deutschland , BRD) between its formation on 23 May 1949 and the German reunification through the accession of East Germany on 3 O ...

. During his final race, Semmelink wore a leather helmet, which was more protection than many racers used at the time. The

U.S. Ski Team The U.S. Ski Team, operating under the auspices of U.S. Ski & Snowboard, develops and supports men's and women's athletes in the sports of alpine skiing, freestyle skiing, cross-country, ski jumping, and Nordic combined. Since 1974 the team and ...

first wore crash helmets at the 1956 Winter Olympics, but most of the Europeans went without.

Results

''Saturday, February 20, 1960''
The race was started at 10:00

local time Local time is the time observed in a specific locality. There is no canonical definition. Originally it was mean solar time, but since the introduction of time zones it is generally the time as determined by the time zone in effect, with daylight s ...

, ( UTC −8). :

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Alpine skiing at the 1960 Winter Olympics - Women's downhill Women's downhill

Oly Oly may refer to: * Oly, informal name for Olympia, Washington, United States * OLY (: ), postnominals granted to participants in the Olympics People with the name * Oly (born 1992), American singer-songwriter and musician * Oly Hicks (born 1968 ...

Alp