White Rock (1977) - full transcript
Eins, zwei...
Arei
- Fantastic!
- You okay?
I've always wanted to do that.
And shooting down that icy tube
at over 70 miles an hour
with up to three g's of pressure
on your body...
Is, uh, a real thrill.
It's a fast, rough, scary ride.
It's the degree
that the olympic athlete
is willing to sacrifice his fear,
that he's able to achieve
that moment of perfection
just below disaster...
And win a gold, silver or bronze.
The winter Olympics,
the most dramatic, exciting championship
in the whole spectrum of sport.
A racing driver loses his nerve,
he can pull over to the side.
A matador gets scared of the bull,
he can jump over the fence.
Even a downhill racer can stop
if he wants to.
But a ski jumper...
He makes his commitment
at the bottom of this tower.
And once he starts his run,
there ain't no turning back.
This is the point of no return.
The starting platform
for the 90-meter olympic ski jump.
It's where the jumper's
moment of truth begins.
Once he enters this icy passage
and starts his exhilarating run...
Each jumper wants to fly forever.
And it's not his will or speed
that stops him.
But in less than 15 seconds,
gravity brings him down.
Here's where they come back to earth.
Anything beyond that hundred-meter Mark,
you have a chance of winning a medal.
And it's steep.
But if it were less steep,
it'd be like a fly hitting
a car windshield.
If my desire to fly...
Were greater than my fear of falling...
I'd love to try this.
And so to all you brave, young heroes...
Who come to use this icy catapult
to fly for your nation's honor...
I wish you well.
Good flights and happy landings.
But I know your secrets.
Yours is not a jump for glory.
It's a jump for joy.
# Searching for gold #
# Searching for gold #
You ready, sepp?
Feel all right?
Now the helmet? Yeah.
All right. Am I ready now?
- Yeah, you're ready now.
- I just need my stick and five guys to hit.
Hey!
Gonna beat the red.
We are the yellow one, the best one.
Best team.
Tonight, eh?
Okay. I approve of that.
And this is the slowest position
in the fastest game in team sports,
I'm the goalie,
and my job is to keep this five and a half
ounces of vulcanized rubber called a puck
out of this goal mouth
that's six foot wide and four foot high.
And although it seems like I'm protected
with all of this gear,
when you see those forwards
coming down at you...
With their flashing blades
and sticks flying...
You know why.
Hey, it's dangerous! Ah!
Ah! Ah!
Ah!
I've fantasized a lot about what it would
be like to be the man behind the mask
in an ice hockey game,
and now that I've experienced
the reality of it,
I have a better understanding of what...
What he goes through.
You need incredible eyesight...
Instinctive reflexes
and a hell of a lot of guts
to be good at that job.
That's Danny gritsch. He's the goalie
for the Austrian olympic team.
Let's watch him work now.
This game is played with six players
per team on the ice at any one time.
- Hey!
- Hey!
Two defensemen, a goalie
and three forwards.
It's broken up into three periods
of 20 minutes each...
With two ten-minute rest periods
in between,
which you really need, believe me.
Come on!
Let's see a little action out there!
Shoot! Shoot!
Yeah!
These olympic players
love to play this game.
They love the feeling
of skating over smooth ice,
blasting that puck 90 miles an hour
into a goalie.
The sheer aggression of the body checking.
For them, it's very much a game to play.
For me, it's very much a game to watch.
Yeah!
Austria's journey to qualify
for the final rounds of the Olympics
starts with a tough one, the Russians.
At the focal point of the Soviet attack
is Danny Gritsch,
the man I stood in for in that very same
goal mouth during olympic training.
It's the toughest evening of Danny's life.
The Russians take on nation after nation.
They're never in any danger
until their last game,
a game that unexpectedly turns against them
from the outset.
Russia's opponents? Czechoslovakia.
A team well-prepared for this olympic final
and passionately committed
to beating the Soviet union.
This will be a fierce conflict.
Ice hockey laced with drama, emotion
and, above all, aggression.
The first Russian goal comes 12 minutes
into the second period.
It's a vital goal that brings the
Soviet union back into the game
after being two goals down.
Come on, Czechoslovakia!
The Russian equalizer comes at a bad time
for Czechoslovakia.
Less than three minutes
before the end of the second period.
Their confidence regained,
the Soviet union will now be hard to beat.
Nine minutes from time,
the Czechs Pierce the Russian defense
and find their Mark through Eduard Novak.
In the 54th minute,
a foul forces novak into the penalty box.
It's a deadly blow for Czechoslovakia.
One minute later, the Russians equalize.
There are less than five minutes
left to play.
The score, 3-3.
The Soviet union capitalized
on their advantage,
leaving the Czechs no time to recover.
Twenty-four seconds later,
Russia scores the winner.
Their final assault is
staged to perfection.
Now, this is the two-man bobsled.
It's the sporty cars of bobsledding.
And we're about to go down
this five-million-dollar
computer-controlled, refrigerated tube
in under 60 seconds.
- Okay?
- Okay.
One, two...
Three, four.
Well, they say that steering
one of these things
is where it's really at in bobsledding.
We're gonna find out right now.
Well, fortunately, I've got one
of the best brakemen in the business.
He's a former Austrian
silver medal winner...
For the two-man Bob.
Missed that one a little bit.
Here we go. Down, down.
A quick one now!
And to the right.
Into the carousel.
Bring it in. Bring it in. Now out.
Control. A right-hander.
Heading down into the end of the groove,
shooting down now.
Two quick bends.
Go into a fast right hand.
Uh, down into the chute.
Into the chute.
On.
Well, that's truly where it's at.
That's a great run.
We'll have to do that more often, man.
Hey, thank you, man. Okay?
So that's the two-man Bob.
What about the luge?
I didn't know what luging was
before coming to Austria.
But ironically, here in the Austrian tirol,
it's older than skiing.
In 1964, it was admitted
as part of the olympic program.
Let's go see what's it's like, shall we?
And that's the luge.
You didn't really think
that was me, did you?
Innsbruck, 1976.
The first games in which the east Germans
compete in the bobsled and luge.
They sweep to victory after victory,
winning all five gold medals.
The established teams from Switzerland,
Italy and west Germany are left trailing.
No other nation features in Austria
with such total mastery of one sport.
East Germany's
is a remarkable olympic debut.
That group of five targets down there
is 150 meters away.
Not a great distance
for a fully balanced and sighted rifle.
Even I got four out of five.
But then I haven't just completed
two and a half kilometers
of competitive cross-country skiing.
That's the basis of the biathlon,
a rigorous contest on snow
requiring the eyesight of a hawk
and the durability of a marathon runner.
It combines a high degree of skill
in two otherwise unrelated sports:
Shooting...
And skiing.
More than any other winter sport...
Cross-country skiing evolved
from a way of life.
The country people in Norway, Sweden,
Finland, even Russia
found that the most efficient way
of getting around during the winter months
was simply to ski.
The rifle was added by the forester,
the hunter.
It became a popular form of sport...
And by 1960 was admitted
into the Olympics as a popular contest.
The biathlete arrives at the shooting zone
and has eight rounds
in which to hit five targets.
If he doesn't succeed in eight shots,
he's compelled to ski a penalty circuit
in an area just behind the shooting zone.
The first shooting bout is in a
prone position, with small targets.
The second, in a standing position
shooting at larger targets.
The biathlon is a sport of contrasts.
The body is driven to the point of
exhaustion, as with a long-distance runner,
and then must immediately relax
to accommodate the requirements
of a marksman.
It's a unique sport in this respect.
Now, I skied less than a thousand meters
before I tried shooting.
I got one out of five.
After two and a half kilometers,
I'm afraid I'd be skiing
that penalty circuit all day long.
To attain olympic standards,
the biathlete must develop
the control and concentration
of a marksman
and reach the peak physical condition
of a cross-country skier.
Deep, steady breathing.
Harmonious coordination of movement.
And the will to compete
beyond his pain barrier.
Then bring these two activities together
under the pressures
of olympic competition.
The biathlon.
Fifteen nations pull away
at the start of the biathlon relay.
Each team is comprised of four men.
Although the speed, endurance and accuracy
of individual competitors is vital,
team consistency will win the gold medal.
The Soviet union win their sixth
cross-country medal of these games.
But the real contest is
for the bronze medal.
After almost two hours
of close-fought competition,
the fourth and final skiers
of the east and west German teams,
Manfred Geyer and Claus Gehrke,
sprint for home.
At the finish, east Germany take the bronze
medal by less than four seconds.
As with the long-distance runner,
the biathlete strives to reach beyond
the limit of his own endurance
to find success.
Pain is often his only reward.
American teenagers
tai babilonia and Randy Gardner
come to Austria in search of a medal.
Less than half a point
will separate them from a bronze.
Where they falter in the eyes of the judges,
they shine in the hearts of the public,
projecting in their skating
a youthful charm and freshness.
Irina rodnina and Alexander Zaitsev
of Russia,
four years undisputed champions
of world pairs figure skating.
Theirs is not a program blessed
with youthful charm,
but instead, technical supremacy
with precision timing
and explosive movement.
Rodnina and Zaitsev remind one
that figure skating is, foremost,
an exacting physical sport
and not theatrical entertainment.
It is this quality of supreme
athletic prowess and technical skill
that takes Rodnina and Zaitsev
to an olympic gold medal
and establishes rodnina
as the most successful pairs figure skater
of any generation.
I'm preparing this pair
of 220 downhill racing skis
with a specially formulated
secret mixture of waxes
that'll give you up to
a tenth of a second more speed
in your downhill times.
You see, all the olympic downhillers
have their own
passionately guarded secret formulas
for waxing,
hoping that it's going to give them the
edge for each condition of the snow.
For instance...
The red for new snow.
The gold for sunny days
or rainy days.
And the silver... for silver days.
That's my secret.
Now we're going up to the top
of patscherkofel mountain.
It's the site of the 1976 men's downhill,
the most prestigious and glamorous event
in the whole winter Olympics.
The run starts just short of 6,000 feet
above sea level
and is quite a challenge to the racer.
It's steep and very fast.
And the man that wins the gold
on this mountain
will not only be olympic champion,
he'll receive more adulation and publicity
than all the other medalists combined.
When a young athlete comes here
from some other part of the world,
how does he learn
this patscherkofel course?
Well, Jim, first of all,
he has to memorize the course.
He goes from one spot to another,
memorize the turns and the curves
and also the bumps and jumps
until the finish.
- Slowly?
- Very slowly.
That he gets it in his head
like a tape, like a movie.
So, when you're in the starting gate,
you're rerunning this movie?
Well, yes, before you're
starting it already,
you rerun it once, twice or three times,
if you're not sure about certain turns
or certain jumps.
Is it as fast as other courses?
Well, I think it is around...
Uh, an average speed of 65 to 70 miles.
- Sixty-five to 75 miles an hour?
- Yes.
Ooh! How's the wax, Karl?
Well, we are talking about
that secret later, okay?
Karl Schranz,
two times world cup winner,
three times champion of the world.
He was hitting over 60 miles an hour
coming down this slope.
And it's quick on skis.
But this year's olympic champion
will have to be doing better than that.
Finf, vier, drei, zwo, eins.
Los.
Each downhill racer
has just one run against the clock,
one chance to win a medal.
The rewards are high.
Victory in the men's downhill
can represent instant recognition,
guaranteed acclaim.
Bernhard Russi of Switzerland
wants only a gold medal.
He's already olympic champion,
and no man has ever won
two olympic downhill titles.
Victory on the patscherkofel
would place Russi alongside Schranz,
Toni Sailer and Jean-Claude Killy,
the downhill immortals.
Finf, vier, drei, zwo, eins. Los.
Franz Klammer is the young lion...
The new sensation of downhill racing,
the challenger
every other racer wants to beat,
russi's rival for supremacy.
Ba, ba, ba, ba, ba!
Ba, ba. Ooh!
The winner of the men's downhill is,
for many, the ultimate olympic champion.
He should be tall, dashing, fearless.
And if the Olympics are held in Innsbruck,
be Austrian.
Franz Klammer is all these things.
Because success rests
on that vital one run,
the downhill racer
is always riding a razor's edge.
His fear is not of falling, but of failing.
Nothing illustrates this better than the
last left-hand turn on the patscherkofel.
Franz Klammer holds it together
and goes on to become olympic champion,
possibly a ski legend.
Philippe Roux of Switzerland
just manages to hold it together
before running out of snow.
Anton Steiner of Austria overreaches
and stretches that fine line
between success and failure too far
and wipes out completely.
It will be another four years
before the next winter Olympics.
This is Rosi Mittermaier of west Germany
winning the ladies' slalom.
She also captured the downhill
and ran second in the giant slalom.
In just five days of
competition in Austria,
Rosi Mittermaier is a triple medal winner.
Only the Olympics
can create a sports legend so quickly...
So dramatically.
In Delphi, when the oracle was there,
the leaders of the world
would stop the wars
and stage the games
because their ideal was epitomized
in the glorification of the olympic hero.
Here in Innsbruck,
in these winter Olympics,
the men and women who projected
themselves beyond their capabilities
and, alone, before the eyes of the world,
attained that moment of perfection...
Can truly be called champions
of the world.
Jo
These heroic achievements stand
to inspire athletes of this generation
and the next and the next.
Each winter Olympics produces
a higher standard of competition,
and the quality of performance grows.
And with it grows the individual.
# Searching for gold #
# Searching for gold #
Arei
- Fantastic!
- You okay?
I've always wanted to do that.
And shooting down that icy tube
at over 70 miles an hour
with up to three g's of pressure
on your body...
Is, uh, a real thrill.
It's a fast, rough, scary ride.
It's the degree
that the olympic athlete
is willing to sacrifice his fear,
that he's able to achieve
that moment of perfection
just below disaster...
And win a gold, silver or bronze.
The winter Olympics,
the most dramatic, exciting championship
in the whole spectrum of sport.
A racing driver loses his nerve,
he can pull over to the side.
A matador gets scared of the bull,
he can jump over the fence.
Even a downhill racer can stop
if he wants to.
But a ski jumper...
He makes his commitment
at the bottom of this tower.
And once he starts his run,
there ain't no turning back.
This is the point of no return.
The starting platform
for the 90-meter olympic ski jump.
It's where the jumper's
moment of truth begins.
Once he enters this icy passage
and starts his exhilarating run...
Each jumper wants to fly forever.
And it's not his will or speed
that stops him.
But in less than 15 seconds,
gravity brings him down.
Here's where they come back to earth.
Anything beyond that hundred-meter Mark,
you have a chance of winning a medal.
And it's steep.
But if it were less steep,
it'd be like a fly hitting
a car windshield.
If my desire to fly...
Were greater than my fear of falling...
I'd love to try this.
And so to all you brave, young heroes...
Who come to use this icy catapult
to fly for your nation's honor...
I wish you well.
Good flights and happy landings.
But I know your secrets.
Yours is not a jump for glory.
It's a jump for joy.
# Searching for gold #
# Searching for gold #
You ready, sepp?
Feel all right?
Now the helmet? Yeah.
All right. Am I ready now?
- Yeah, you're ready now.
- I just need my stick and five guys to hit.
Hey!
Gonna beat the red.
We are the yellow one, the best one.
Best team.
Tonight, eh?
Okay. I approve of that.
And this is the slowest position
in the fastest game in team sports,
I'm the goalie,
and my job is to keep this five and a half
ounces of vulcanized rubber called a puck
out of this goal mouth
that's six foot wide and four foot high.
And although it seems like I'm protected
with all of this gear,
when you see those forwards
coming down at you...
With their flashing blades
and sticks flying...
You know why.
Hey, it's dangerous! Ah!
Ah! Ah!
Ah!
I've fantasized a lot about what it would
be like to be the man behind the mask
in an ice hockey game,
and now that I've experienced
the reality of it,
I have a better understanding of what...
What he goes through.
You need incredible eyesight...
Instinctive reflexes
and a hell of a lot of guts
to be good at that job.
That's Danny gritsch. He's the goalie
for the Austrian olympic team.
Let's watch him work now.
This game is played with six players
per team on the ice at any one time.
- Hey!
- Hey!
Two defensemen, a goalie
and three forwards.
It's broken up into three periods
of 20 minutes each...
With two ten-minute rest periods
in between,
which you really need, believe me.
Come on!
Let's see a little action out there!
Shoot! Shoot!
Yeah!
These olympic players
love to play this game.
They love the feeling
of skating over smooth ice,
blasting that puck 90 miles an hour
into a goalie.
The sheer aggression of the body checking.
For them, it's very much a game to play.
For me, it's very much a game to watch.
Yeah!
Austria's journey to qualify
for the final rounds of the Olympics
starts with a tough one, the Russians.
At the focal point of the Soviet attack
is Danny Gritsch,
the man I stood in for in that very same
goal mouth during olympic training.
It's the toughest evening of Danny's life.
The Russians take on nation after nation.
They're never in any danger
until their last game,
a game that unexpectedly turns against them
from the outset.
Russia's opponents? Czechoslovakia.
A team well-prepared for this olympic final
and passionately committed
to beating the Soviet union.
This will be a fierce conflict.
Ice hockey laced with drama, emotion
and, above all, aggression.
The first Russian goal comes 12 minutes
into the second period.
It's a vital goal that brings the
Soviet union back into the game
after being two goals down.
Come on, Czechoslovakia!
The Russian equalizer comes at a bad time
for Czechoslovakia.
Less than three minutes
before the end of the second period.
Their confidence regained,
the Soviet union will now be hard to beat.
Nine minutes from time,
the Czechs Pierce the Russian defense
and find their Mark through Eduard Novak.
In the 54th minute,
a foul forces novak into the penalty box.
It's a deadly blow for Czechoslovakia.
One minute later, the Russians equalize.
There are less than five minutes
left to play.
The score, 3-3.
The Soviet union capitalized
on their advantage,
leaving the Czechs no time to recover.
Twenty-four seconds later,
Russia scores the winner.
Their final assault is
staged to perfection.
Now, this is the two-man bobsled.
It's the sporty cars of bobsledding.
And we're about to go down
this five-million-dollar
computer-controlled, refrigerated tube
in under 60 seconds.
- Okay?
- Okay.
One, two...
Three, four.
Well, they say that steering
one of these things
is where it's really at in bobsledding.
We're gonna find out right now.
Well, fortunately, I've got one
of the best brakemen in the business.
He's a former Austrian
silver medal winner...
For the two-man Bob.
Missed that one a little bit.
Here we go. Down, down.
A quick one now!
And to the right.
Into the carousel.
Bring it in. Bring it in. Now out.
Control. A right-hander.
Heading down into the end of the groove,
shooting down now.
Two quick bends.
Go into a fast right hand.
Uh, down into the chute.
Into the chute.
On.
Well, that's truly where it's at.
That's a great run.
We'll have to do that more often, man.
Hey, thank you, man. Okay?
So that's the two-man Bob.
What about the luge?
I didn't know what luging was
before coming to Austria.
But ironically, here in the Austrian tirol,
it's older than skiing.
In 1964, it was admitted
as part of the olympic program.
Let's go see what's it's like, shall we?
And that's the luge.
You didn't really think
that was me, did you?
Innsbruck, 1976.
The first games in which the east Germans
compete in the bobsled and luge.
They sweep to victory after victory,
winning all five gold medals.
The established teams from Switzerland,
Italy and west Germany are left trailing.
No other nation features in Austria
with such total mastery of one sport.
East Germany's
is a remarkable olympic debut.
That group of five targets down there
is 150 meters away.
Not a great distance
for a fully balanced and sighted rifle.
Even I got four out of five.
But then I haven't just completed
two and a half kilometers
of competitive cross-country skiing.
That's the basis of the biathlon,
a rigorous contest on snow
requiring the eyesight of a hawk
and the durability of a marathon runner.
It combines a high degree of skill
in two otherwise unrelated sports:
Shooting...
And skiing.
More than any other winter sport...
Cross-country skiing evolved
from a way of life.
The country people in Norway, Sweden,
Finland, even Russia
found that the most efficient way
of getting around during the winter months
was simply to ski.
The rifle was added by the forester,
the hunter.
It became a popular form of sport...
And by 1960 was admitted
into the Olympics as a popular contest.
The biathlete arrives at the shooting zone
and has eight rounds
in which to hit five targets.
If he doesn't succeed in eight shots,
he's compelled to ski a penalty circuit
in an area just behind the shooting zone.
The first shooting bout is in a
prone position, with small targets.
The second, in a standing position
shooting at larger targets.
The biathlon is a sport of contrasts.
The body is driven to the point of
exhaustion, as with a long-distance runner,
and then must immediately relax
to accommodate the requirements
of a marksman.
It's a unique sport in this respect.
Now, I skied less than a thousand meters
before I tried shooting.
I got one out of five.
After two and a half kilometers,
I'm afraid I'd be skiing
that penalty circuit all day long.
To attain olympic standards,
the biathlete must develop
the control and concentration
of a marksman
and reach the peak physical condition
of a cross-country skier.
Deep, steady breathing.
Harmonious coordination of movement.
And the will to compete
beyond his pain barrier.
Then bring these two activities together
under the pressures
of olympic competition.
The biathlon.
Fifteen nations pull away
at the start of the biathlon relay.
Each team is comprised of four men.
Although the speed, endurance and accuracy
of individual competitors is vital,
team consistency will win the gold medal.
The Soviet union win their sixth
cross-country medal of these games.
But the real contest is
for the bronze medal.
After almost two hours
of close-fought competition,
the fourth and final skiers
of the east and west German teams,
Manfred Geyer and Claus Gehrke,
sprint for home.
At the finish, east Germany take the bronze
medal by less than four seconds.
As with the long-distance runner,
the biathlete strives to reach beyond
the limit of his own endurance
to find success.
Pain is often his only reward.
American teenagers
tai babilonia and Randy Gardner
come to Austria in search of a medal.
Less than half a point
will separate them from a bronze.
Where they falter in the eyes of the judges,
they shine in the hearts of the public,
projecting in their skating
a youthful charm and freshness.
Irina rodnina and Alexander Zaitsev
of Russia,
four years undisputed champions
of world pairs figure skating.
Theirs is not a program blessed
with youthful charm,
but instead, technical supremacy
with precision timing
and explosive movement.
Rodnina and Zaitsev remind one
that figure skating is, foremost,
an exacting physical sport
and not theatrical entertainment.
It is this quality of supreme
athletic prowess and technical skill
that takes Rodnina and Zaitsev
to an olympic gold medal
and establishes rodnina
as the most successful pairs figure skater
of any generation.
I'm preparing this pair
of 220 downhill racing skis
with a specially formulated
secret mixture of waxes
that'll give you up to
a tenth of a second more speed
in your downhill times.
You see, all the olympic downhillers
have their own
passionately guarded secret formulas
for waxing,
hoping that it's going to give them the
edge for each condition of the snow.
For instance...
The red for new snow.
The gold for sunny days
or rainy days.
And the silver... for silver days.
That's my secret.
Now we're going up to the top
of patscherkofel mountain.
It's the site of the 1976 men's downhill,
the most prestigious and glamorous event
in the whole winter Olympics.
The run starts just short of 6,000 feet
above sea level
and is quite a challenge to the racer.
It's steep and very fast.
And the man that wins the gold
on this mountain
will not only be olympic champion,
he'll receive more adulation and publicity
than all the other medalists combined.
When a young athlete comes here
from some other part of the world,
how does he learn
this patscherkofel course?
Well, Jim, first of all,
he has to memorize the course.
He goes from one spot to another,
memorize the turns and the curves
and also the bumps and jumps
until the finish.
- Slowly?
- Very slowly.
That he gets it in his head
like a tape, like a movie.
So, when you're in the starting gate,
you're rerunning this movie?
Well, yes, before you're
starting it already,
you rerun it once, twice or three times,
if you're not sure about certain turns
or certain jumps.
Is it as fast as other courses?
Well, I think it is around...
Uh, an average speed of 65 to 70 miles.
- Sixty-five to 75 miles an hour?
- Yes.
Ooh! How's the wax, Karl?
Well, we are talking about
that secret later, okay?
Karl Schranz,
two times world cup winner,
three times champion of the world.
He was hitting over 60 miles an hour
coming down this slope.
And it's quick on skis.
But this year's olympic champion
will have to be doing better than that.
Finf, vier, drei, zwo, eins.
Los.
Each downhill racer
has just one run against the clock,
one chance to win a medal.
The rewards are high.
Victory in the men's downhill
can represent instant recognition,
guaranteed acclaim.
Bernhard Russi of Switzerland
wants only a gold medal.
He's already olympic champion,
and no man has ever won
two olympic downhill titles.
Victory on the patscherkofel
would place Russi alongside Schranz,
Toni Sailer and Jean-Claude Killy,
the downhill immortals.
Finf, vier, drei, zwo, eins. Los.
Franz Klammer is the young lion...
The new sensation of downhill racing,
the challenger
every other racer wants to beat,
russi's rival for supremacy.
Ba, ba, ba, ba, ba!
Ba, ba. Ooh!
The winner of the men's downhill is,
for many, the ultimate olympic champion.
He should be tall, dashing, fearless.
And if the Olympics are held in Innsbruck,
be Austrian.
Franz Klammer is all these things.
Because success rests
on that vital one run,
the downhill racer
is always riding a razor's edge.
His fear is not of falling, but of failing.
Nothing illustrates this better than the
last left-hand turn on the patscherkofel.
Franz Klammer holds it together
and goes on to become olympic champion,
possibly a ski legend.
Philippe Roux of Switzerland
just manages to hold it together
before running out of snow.
Anton Steiner of Austria overreaches
and stretches that fine line
between success and failure too far
and wipes out completely.
It will be another four years
before the next winter Olympics.
This is Rosi Mittermaier of west Germany
winning the ladies' slalom.
She also captured the downhill
and ran second in the giant slalom.
In just five days of
competition in Austria,
Rosi Mittermaier is a triple medal winner.
Only the Olympics
can create a sports legend so quickly...
So dramatically.
In Delphi, when the oracle was there,
the leaders of the world
would stop the wars
and stage the games
because their ideal was epitomized
in the glorification of the olympic hero.
Here in Innsbruck,
in these winter Olympics,
the men and women who projected
themselves beyond their capabilities
and, alone, before the eyes of the world,
attained that moment of perfection...
Can truly be called champions
of the world.
Jo
These heroic achievements stand
to inspire athletes of this generation
and the next and the next.
Each winter Olympics produces
a higher standard of competition,
and the quality of performance grows.
And with it grows the individual.
# Searching for gold #
# Searching for gold #