The Men's Downhill competition of the Albertville 1992 Olympics was held at

Val d'Isère Val may refer to: Military equipment * Aichi D3A, a Japanese World War II dive bomber codenamed "Val" by the Allies * AS Val, a Soviet assault rifle Music *''Val'', album by Val Doonican * VAL (band), Belarusian pop duo People * Val (g ...

on Sunday, 9 February. 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

Franz Heinzer Franz Heinzer (born 11 April 1962 in Rickenbach, Schwyz, Switzerland) is a former alpine ski racer, who specialized in downhill. He was World Cup champion in downhill three consecutive seasons (1991, 1992, 1993), second only to Franz Klammer ( ...

of Switzerland, who was also the defending

World Cup A world cup is a global sporting competition in which the participant entities – usually international teams or individuals representing their countries – compete for the title of world champion. The event most associated with the name is ...

downhill champion and led the current season. Defending Olympic champion

Pirmin Zurbriggen Pirmin Zurbriggen (born 4 February 1963) is a former FIS Alpine Ski World Cup, World Cup Alpine skiing, alpine ski racer from Switzerland. One of the most successful ski racers ever, he won the overall World Cup title four times, an Alpine skiing ...

of Switzerland had retired from competition two years earlier; this was the fourth consecutive Olympics without the defending champion in the field. The race was run on a new course on ''

La face de Bellevarde La face de Bellevarde is a World Cup downhill ski course in France, on Rocher de Bellevarde mountain in Val-d'Isère, Savoie; it debuted at the 1992 Winter Olympics with the men's downhill. It is only about kilometres up the road from "P ...

'', designed by

1972 Within the context of Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) it was the longest year ever, as two leap seconds were added during this 366-day year, an event which has not since been repeated. (If its start and end are defined using Solar time, ...

champion

Bernhard Russi Bernhard Russi (born 20 August 1948) is a former World Cup alpine ski racer from Switzerland. Born in Andermatt in the canton of Uri, he is an Olympic, World Cup, and World champion in the downhill event.Patrick Ortlieb Patrick Ortlieb (born 20 May 1967) is a former World Cup alpine ski racer and Olympic gold medalist from Austria. A specialist in the speed events, he was also a world champion in the downhill event. Born in Bregenz in Vorarlberg, Ortlieb start ...

, who had yet to win a World Cup event, won the gold medal;

Franck Piccard Franck Piccard (born 17 September 1964) is a French former Alpine skier. A native of Les Saisies, Piccard won a total of four Alpine Skiing World Cup races. At the 1988 Olympics in Calgary he won a gold medal in the Super-G competition (th ...

of France was only 0.05 seconds back to take the silver, and the bronze medalist was

Günther Mader Günther Mader (born 24 June 1964) is a former alpine ski racer and Olympic medalist from Austria. Born in Matrei am Brenner, Tyrol, he is one of only five men to have won World Cup races in all five alpine disciplines ( downhill, super-G, gian ...

of Austria. Ortlieb was first racer on the course, and he became the fifth Austrian to win the event, in its twelfth edition. Heinzer was sixth, more than a second back. The course started at an

elevation The elevation of a geographic location (geography), ''location'' is its height above or below a fixed reference point, most commonly a reference geoid, a mathematical model of the Earth's sea level as an equipotential gravitational equipotenti ...

of above

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

with a vertical drop of and a course length of . Ortlieb's winning time of 110.37 seconds yielded an average course speed of , with an average vertical descent rate of .

Results

The race was started at 12:15

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 Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) is the primary time standard globally used to regulate clocks and time. It establishes a reference for the current time, forming the basis for civil time and time zones. UTC facilitates international communica ...

+1). At the starting gate, the skies were clear, the temperature was , and the snow condition was hard; the temperature at the finish was lower, at . Source:

References

External links

FIS results
{{DEFAULTSORT:Alpine skiing at the 1992 Winter Olympics - Men's downhill Men's downhill

Winter Olympics The Winter Olympic Games (), also known as the Winter Olympics, is a major international multi-sport event held once every four years for sports practiced on snow and ice. The first Winter Olympic Games, the 1924 Winter Olympics, were held i ...