Trying to quell her nervousness, Diann Roffe-Steinrotter remembered the feisty nature of a dear friend who had died chasing speed down the slopes of Germany.
“She was such a fighter,” Roffe-Steinrotter said of Austria’s Ulrike Maier. “And I wanted to do the same thing.”
Racing down Norway’s imposing Kvitfjell, Roffe-Steinrotter’s poignant impetus allowed her to complete an improbable run for gold in the women’s super-giant slalom Tuesday morning.
“The funny thing about the Olympic Games,” she said, “is one day, one hill, one and a half minutes, and whoever shakes and bakes the best is going to win the medal.”
It marked her first victory in nine years and continued the United States’ surprising domination against the world’s best alpine competition in the Olympics.
Her performance follows Tommy Moe’s gold-medal run in the men’s downhill and a 2-3 finish in the downhill portion of the men’s combined.
“The big question of the day has been, `What’s going on with the Americans? How do you do this?’ ” Roffe-Steinrotter said. “If I knew I’d tell you, but I have no idea.”
Few would have expected Roffe-Steinrotter to hold the lead after a run of 1 minute, 22.15 seconds as the first skier down the twisting, 2,035-meter slope. Thirty-four skiers later, Russia’s Svetlana Gladischeva finished at 1:22.44 to claim silver. Italy’s Isolde Kostner was third at 1:22.45.
Roffe-Steinrotter, 26, had not won since the giant slalom at the 1985 world championships in Italy, followed by a World Cup giant-slalom victory the next week at Lake Placid, N.Y.
Since then, her career has been punctuated by inconsistency and injury, including a serious knee injury that triggered thoughts of retirement when she did not score any World Cup points in 1987. A high point came in 1992 when she captured an Olympic silver medal in Meribel, France, although she did not finish the super-G event after falling during the first 20 seconds of her run.
Most recently, Roffe-Steinrotter failed to qualify in a giant-slalom World Cup event in France, fueling speculation that she might retire before completing what she has said will be her last World Cup season.
“I hadn’t had a lot of results this year, obviously, but it’s been strange,” she said. “I’ve had brilliant moments but it just hasn’t come out in one run on paper, and I really had to believe that, especially at the Olympic Games.”
The event included a number of mishaps, blamed on fast course conditions. Skiers came out of the top part of the run out of control, making it hard to weave through the gates in the middle section. Nine skiers failed to finish, including two Slovenians who were ahead of Roffe-Steinrotter at the midway timing point.
Running first, Roffe-Steinrotter did not have the benefit of a course report from coaches positioned along the course. The image of her friend’s horrifying crash on the slopes Jan. 29 of Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany, remained vivid at the top of the hill. But instead of dwelling on the tragedy, Roffe-Steinrotter thought of Maier’s unwavering spirit.
Roffe-Steinrotter had shown the same determination herself, shortly after tearing a patellar tendon in 1986, then an anterior cruciate ligament in her left knee in 1991.
Her husband, Willi, noticed what he called “a spark in her skis” while she was warming up. “It was something she hadn’t shown in quite a while,” he said. “That look in her face; that look in her eye. You knew she was determined.”
Final year. Final Olympics.
Roffe-Steinrotter sped down the slope, weaving a perfect ending.
“What it really boiled down to is that you can pre-think and have ideas of the course and know exactly what you’re going to do, but if you don’t go for it and take some risks . . . that was my biggest advantage,” she said. “I didn’t want to be fourth. I didn’t want to be fifth. I didn’t want to be sixth. And at the Olympic Games, if you don’t risk everything, you won’t be there.
“This doesn’t change my plans at all. I think this is my final season. I’ll say it officially, but I’m going to finish out the season and enjoy every minute of this. I was pretty lucky to pull this one off, considering the way my season has been. But, hey, nobody can take it away now.”
