Top 10 Heroes of the Winter Olympics - NZ Herald (2024)

As Vancouver prepares its skifields and stadiums for the 21st Winter Olympics, David Leggat takes a look at some of the athletes whose magnificent bravery and achievements have been frozen in time.

1 Eric Heiden, Lake Placid, 1980

The American speed skater bagged five individual golds at one Olympics - the first athlete to do so, winter or summer.

Heiden was 21 at the time of the Games in New York, a doctor's son from Wisconsin and even now is a decent contender for the greatest of all Winter Games performers.

The huge-thighed Heiden set four Olympic and one world record along the way. He took gold in the 500m, 1000m, 1500m, 5000m and to round it off the 10,000m in a world record 14min 28.13s.

He made it into ESPN's 50 Greatest Athletes of the 20th century, the only speed skater on the list. Heiden is now an orthopaedic surgeon.

Fame and glory didn't sit comfortably with him, and he retired shortly after. "I really liked it best when I was a nobody," he said. As for his golden haul: "Heck, gold medals, what can you do with them? I'd rather get a nice warmup suit. That's something I can use."

2 United States ice hockey, Lake Placid, 1980

It's still called "The Miracle on Ice", and it wasn't even a final.

It was the day a young team of US amateurs and collegiate players beat the might of the USSR, 4-3, in a semifinal. No one gave them a chance. It wasn't even screened live. At the time, the US had hostages in Iran, inflation going through the roof and a boycott of the Summer Olympics in Moscow coming up.

The Soviets had won all but one Olympic gold since 1956. Patriotic fervour hung thick in the air. Captain Mike Eruzione scored the winning goal and retired after the Games, figuring nothing would top it. Two days later the young Americans beat Finland 4-2 in the final.

"Do you believe in miracles? Yes!" roared commentator Al Michaels at the moment of victory.

On March 3 that year, Sports Illustrated ran a photograph of the triumph without any accompanying words, the only time the magazine had done so in its history.

3 Franz Klammer, Innsbruck, 1976

Still known as the greatest of all downhill runs, the most hair-raising, heart-in-mouth sprint you'll see (and you can, check out YouTube).

Klammer was the Austrian hero at their Games, a winner of eight out of nine World Cup races the previous year.

The "Klammer Express" was expected to bring home the gold for his nation.

But defending champion, Swiss Bernhard Russi, set the bar at 1min 46.06. Eleven other racers tried and failed to bump Russi off top spot.

Klammer, with 60,000 Austrians lining the course, raced last on what was thought the most treacherous layout in Olympic downhill history.

He almost veered off course more than once in a manic, furious charge.

Klammer landed on one ski more than once as he hurtled down the icy terrain.

As he flashed across the line, the time came up: 1:45.73.

Austria had their hero.

4 Dan Jansen, Lillehammer, 1994

On the day American world sprint champion Jansen was to skate the 500m final, he learned his sister had died of leukemia. He went on to the ice and fell.

He tried again, and failed in both the 500m and 1000m, at the 1992 Games.

Two years later, in his final race, and rated a longshot, he set a world record in the 1000m to win gold.

He then took his baby daughter, named Jane after his late sister, on a victory lap.

There was hardly a dry eye in the arena. "It's still the only time I've ever cried in a press box," NBC commentator Jimmy Roberts said.

He now oversees the Dan Jansen Foundation, which raises money to fight leukemia.

5 Hermann Maier, Nagano, 1998

"The Herminator" was 25 when he arrived in Japan.

During the downhill, he flipped 10 metres in the air, landed on his head and crashed through two fences - by all rights he should have been at least half dead.

But after a few minutes, he stood up, unscathed but for a bruised shoulder and strained right knee, perhaps the world's luckiest bloke.

Three days later Maier won the Super G gold; another three days on, he clinched the giant slalom.

"Maybe he really is an alien," his girlfriend said at the time.

In a remarkable career, Maier won four overall World Cup titles and 54 cup races.

6 Torvill and Dean, Sarajevo, 1984

The British pair transformed ice dancing in less than five minutes with their performance of Ravel's Bolero.

Jayne Torvill, an insurance book clerk, and policeman Christopher Dean gave the discipline star quality with their electrifying routine.

The result? Perfect scores of 6.0 for artistic impression from every judge.

The pair turned professional for 10 years before returning to amateur status for the 1994 Olympics.

There was a hilarious postscript to their golden 4 minutes, 28 seconds in Sarajevo.

The stuffy International Skating Union assessed their impact so great - and therefore so worrying - they made most of their moves in that routine illegal.

7 Annelise Coberger, Albertville, 1992

What, a Kiwi in this esteemed list? Well, considering the Christchurch 21-year-old became the first skier from the Southern Hemisphere to win a Winter Olympics medal, she deserves her place.

Coberger had won a World Cup slalom at Hinterstoder, Austria, earlier in the season and was far from a complete outsider when the field assembled at the Meribel resort.

Coberger sat eighth after the first run, before a sizzling second effort gave her a time of 1:33.10 and top spot.

Then came the agonising wait while a raft of other contenders completed the course. Coberger was only bumped out of the gold medal place by Austrian Petra Kronberger, one of the last to race, who put up 1:32.68.

Still one of New Zealand's all-time great Olympic performances.

8 Jean-Claude Killy, Grenoble, 1968

Often referred to as the Killympics, so much did the French heartthrob dominate these Games in his homeland.

Killy won the downhill, giant slalom and slalom, the only three alpine events contested at the time.

He had a scare on the final leg when close rival, Austrian Karl Schranz, suddenly stopped after the 21st gate, claiming a man in black had crossed the course in front of him.

He won a reprieve, and with his re-run, won the race - temporarily. It transpired Schranz had missed two gates before the mysterious Mr Black crossed his path, thus disqualifying him, handing Killy his triple gold.

"Every girl fantasised about Jean-Claude," skating legend Peggy Fleming, herself a gold medallist in Grenoble, said.

9 Jamaican bobsleigh, Calgary, 1988

The quartet who were immortalised in the 1993 movie

Cool Runnings

became cult heroes 22 years ago.

But while they began as figures of fun among the starchy Europeans, they ended up being credible racers.

The four, Devon Harris, Dudley Stokes, Michael White and Samuel Clayton, were coached by New Yorker Howard Siler - the John Candy character of the movie.

Yes, their sled flipped over and they carried it to the line, to rapturous applause. But what's not often remembered is that they returned in Lillehammer six years later, and finished 14th, ahead of both American entries.

10 Michael 'Eddie The Eagle' Edwards, Calgary, 1988

The British ski jumper didn't belong in the Olympic event, at least in terms of performance, but he was eligible to go, so he did and gained a huge, if brief, following based on complete ineptitude. He was a plasterer, who wore oversized glasses.

"When I looked from the top of the jump I was so frightened that my bum shrivelled into a prune," he recalled.

Predictably Edwards finished last - but alive - in both the 70m and 90m events. The press dubbed him "Mr Magoo" and he became a celebrity figure for a time.

The International Olympic Committee reacted with their usual good humour, as you'd expect - tightening the rules for qualification to rub out future "Eddies".