Word: ortlieb
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1990-1999
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...people in the little man's Games, Teruel is as much a fan as a participant, enjoying a front-seat view of the lions of a sport he took up 20 years ago. One day, he says happily, he found himself at breakfast next to downhill champion Patrick Ortlieb. Downhill combined winner Josef Polig shared an elevator with him the day before the Italian won his gold. Teruel dreams of meeting Jean-Claude Killy or even just wearing clothes from the "Killy Sport" store in Val d'Isere...
...sport, or every life that knows a slip, a birth, a marriage, but in the Olympics an athlete comes into the spotlight for a second and then, in most cases, disappears into oblivion for four years. The first question asked of the first male gold medalist, Austrian downhiller Patrick Ortlieb, was whether he had thought, during his run, of his teammate Gernot Reinstadler, who died in a race last year. He couldn't, the affable big man said simply, he couldn't afford to think of accidents or of anything but the course. One moment of sentiment could mean...
Time plays strange tricks in the Winter Games. Ortlieb was the first one down the hill, whooshing through the course in 1:50:37; then, like the rest of us, he could do nothing but watch the scoreboard, as 55 other skiers, one by one, tried to eclipse his time. He had competed only against himself; the others were up against the clock. Athletes at their greatest can attain almost meditative states -- the so-called zone -- in which time slows down or seems suspended. We, however, bring them back to earth with our deadlines. Hardly had the majestic figure-skating...
| 1 |