The Men's Downhill competition of the Nagano 1998 Olympics was held at

Hakuba is a village located in Nagano Prefecture, Japan. As of April 1, 2019, the village had an estimated population of 9,007 in 4267 households, and a population density of 48 persons per km2. The total area of the village is . Hakuba is located i ...

on Friday, February 13. Originally scheduled for Sunday, the race was postponed several times due to heavy snow, followed by rain and gusty winds. The reigning

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 Bruno Kernen of Switzerland, while France's

Luc Alphand Luc Alphand (born 6 August 1965) is a former World Cup alpine ski racer from France. He specialized in the speed events and later became a race car driver. Ski racing Born in Briançon (Hautes-Alpes), Alphand was world junior champion in 19 ...

was the reigning

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, but had since retired from competition. The defending Olympic champion was

Tommy Moe Thomas Sven Moe (born February 17, 1970) is a former World Cup alpine ski racer from the United States. An Olympic gold and silver medalist in 1994, he specialized in the speed events of downhill and super G. Early years Born in Missoula, Mon ...

of the United States. France's

Jean-Luc Crétier Jean-Luc Crétier (born 28 April 1966 in Albertville, Savoie) is a retired French World Cup alpine ski racer. He was one of the four members of the "Top Guns" team, created and trained by Serge Guillaume outside the mainstream of the Frenc ...

won the gold medal,

Lasse Kjus Lasse Kjus (born 14 January 1971) is a former World Cup alpine ski racer from Norway. He won the overall World Cup title twice, an Olympic gold medal, and several World Championships. His combined career total of 16 Olympic and World Champions ...

of Norway took the silver, and the bronze medalist was

Hannes Trinkl Hannes Trinkl (born 1 February 1968 in Steyr) is an Austrian former alpine skier. Trinkl was the bronze medallist in the downhill in the 1998 Winter Olympics, finishing 0.01 seconds ahead of fourth-placed Jürg Grünenfelder. His first ...

of Austria; Moe was twelfth and Kernan did not finish. Nine of the first twenty failed to finish, including a crash by favorite

Hermann Maier Hermann Maier (born 7 December 1972) is an Austrian former World Cup champion alpine ski racer and Olympic gold medalist. Nicknamed the "Herminator", Maier ranks among the greatest alpine ski racers in history, with four overall World Cup tit ...

of Austria, which he walked away from. Luca Cattaneo's injury caused a half-hour delay underneath the clear skies, as the temperature at the finish approached . Of the eight with bib numbers 13 through 20, only Moe completed the race; in total, fifteen of the 43 racers did not finish. It was the sole victory of Crétier's career; he had five World cup podiums, three of which were in the two months preceding the Olympics, at the notable venues of Beaver Creek,

Wengen Wengen () is a mountain village in the Bernese Oberland of central Switzerland. Located in the canton of Bern at an elevation of above sea level, it is part of the Jungfrauregion and has approximately 1,300 year-round residents, which swells t ...

, and

Kitzbühel Kitzbühel (, also: ; ) is a town rights, medieval town situated in the Kitzbühel Alps along the river Kitzbüheler Ache in Tyrol (state), Tyrol, Austria, about east of the state capital Innsbruck and is the administrative centre of the Kitzbüh ...

. Entering the Olympics, he was fourth in the season's World Cup downhill standings. 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 . Crétier's winning time was 110.11 seconds, yielding an average course speed of , with an average vertical descent rate of .

Results

The race was started at 11:00 local time, (

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 ...

+9). At the starting gate, the skies were clear, the temperature was , and the snow condition was hard; the temperature at the finish at . :

References

External links

FIS resultsResults
{{DEFAULTSORT:Alpine skiing at the 1998 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 ...