Alpine skiing at the 1976 Winter Olympics – Men's downhill

Men's downhill at the XII Olympic Winter Games
Alpine skiing
Venue	Patscherkofel Tyrol, Austria
Date	5 February 1976
Competitors	74 from 27 nations
Winning time	1:45.73
Medalists
Franz Klammer   Austria   Bernhard Russi   Switzerland   Herbert Plank   Italy

Alpine skiing at the 1976 Winter Olympics
Downhill		men		women
Giant slalom		men		women
Slalom		men		women

Men's Downhill
Location	Patscherkofel
Vertical	870 m (2,854 ft)
Top elevation	1,950 m (6,398 ft)
Base elevation	1,080 m (3,543 ft)

Patscherkofel

Location in Austria

The Men's Downhill competition of the 1976 Winter Olympics at Innsbruck, Austria, was held on 5 February at Patscherkofel,^[1] on the same course as in 1964.

The defending world champion was David Zwilling of Austria, and Bernhard Russi of Switzerland was the defending Olympic champion. Franz Klammer of Austria was the defending World Cup downhill champion and led the 1976 World Cup.^[2][3] He had also won the pre-Olympic World Cup downhill at Patcherkofel a year earlier in January 1975.

The starting gate was at an elevation of 1,950 m (6,398 ft), and the vertical drop was 870 m (2,854 ft).^[1] The course length was 3.020 km (1.877 mi) and Klammer's famous winning run resulted in an average speed of 102.828 km/h (63.89 mph), with an average vertical descent rate of 8.2285 m/s (27.00 ft/s). The win elevated him to an international celebrity and he was featured on the cover of Sports Illustrated.^[4]

Egon Zimmermann, also of Austria, took the gold medal a dozen years earlier in the 1964 Olympic downhill. His winning time was 2:18.16, more than a half minute behind Klammer's.

Results

Rank	Bib	Name	Country	Time	Difference
	15	Franz Klammer	Austria	1:45.73	—
	3	Bernhard Russi	Switzerland	1:46.06	+0.33
	8	Herbert Plank	Italy	1:46.59	+0.86
4	11	Philippe Roux	Switzerland	1:46.69	+0.96
5	10	Ken Read	Canada	1:46.83	+1.10
6	19	Andy Mill	United States	1:47.06	+1.33
7	29	Walter Tresch	Switzerland	1:47.29	+1.56
8	13	Dave Irwin	Canada	1:47.41	+1.68
9	6	Sepp Walcher	Austria	1:47.45	+1.72
10	5	Jim Hunter	Canada	1:47.52	+1.79
11	30	Greg Jones	United States	1:47.84	+2.11
12	1	René Berthod	Switzerland	1:47.89	+2.16
13	22	Pete Patterson	United States	1:47.94	+2.21
14	21	Rolando Thoeni	Italy	1:48.13	+2.40
15	20	Peter Fischer	West Germany	1:48.18	+2.45
16	24	Patrice Pellat-Finet	France	1:48.34	+2.61
17	25	Sepp Ferstl	West Germany	1:48.41	+2.68
18	28	Dave Murray	Canada	1:48.43	+2.70
19	4	Klaus Eberhard	Austria	1:48.45	+2.72
20	42	Sumihiro Tomii	Japan	1:48.88	+3.15
21	16	Willi Frommelt	Liechtenstein	1:48.92	+3.19
22	31	David Griff	Australia	1:49.02	+3.29
	2	Michael Veith	West Germany
24	27	Karl Anderson	United States	1:49.08	+3.35
25	9	Erik Håker	Norway	1:49.19	+3.46
26	14	Gustavo Thoeni	Italy	1:49.25	+3.52
27	18	Mikio Katagiri	Japan	1:50.03	+4.30
28	38	Andreas Wenzel	Liechtenstein	1:50.08	+4.35
29	46	Wolfgang Junginger	West Germany	1:50.48	+4.75
30	37	Alan Stewart	Great Britain	1:50.56	+4.83
31	44	Luis Rosenkjer	Argentina	1:50.87	+5.14
32	34	Stuart Fitzsimmons	Great Britain	1:50.89	+5.16
33	45	Bohumír Zeman	Czechoslovakia	1:51.27	+5.54
34	35	Kim Clifford	Australia	1:51.64	+5.91
35	17	Francisco Fernández Ochoa	Spain	1:51.91	+6.18
36	36	Juan Manuel Fernández Ochoa	Spain	1:52.40	+6.67
37	43	Andrej Koželj	Yugoslavia	1:52.75	+7.02
	33	Peter Fuchs	Great Britain
39	39	Juan Angel Olivieri	Argentina	1:52.76	+7.03
40	55	Miloslav Sochor	Czechoslovakia	1:53.48	+7.75
41	32	Jaime Ros	Spain	1:53.50	+7.77
42	59	Jorge García	Spain	1:53.55	+7.82
43	58	Didier Xhaet	Belgium	1:53.56	+7.83
44	49	Vladimir Andreyev	Soviet Union	1:53.61	+7.88
45	41	Robert Blanchaer	Belgium	1:54.30	+8.57
46	40	Adjin Pašović	Yugoslavia	1:54.57	+8.84
47	54	Carlos Alberto Martínez	Argentina	1:54.62	+8.89
48	56	Ivan Penev	Bulgaria	1:55.56	+9.83
49	74	Dan Cristea	Romania	1:55.63	+9.90
50	70	Georgi Kochov	Bulgaria	1:55.82	+10.09
51	47	José Luis Koifman	Chile	1:56.30	+10.57
52	50	Roman Dereziński	Poland	1:56.33	+10.60
53	67	Stuart Blakely	New Zealand	1:57.91	+12.18
54	52	Antoine Crespo	Andorra	1:58.72	+12.99
55	53	Gorban Ali Kalhor	Iran	1:59.15	+13.42
56	62	Mohammad Hadj Kia Shemshaki	Iran	1:59.44	+13.71
57	68	Ion Cavaşi	Romania	2:00.19	+14.46
58	61	Akbar Kalili	Iran	2:00.32	+14.59
59	75	Rafael Cañas	Chile	2:00.39	+14.66
60	69	Brett Kendall	New Zealand	2:00.57	+14.84
61	63	Fernando Reutter	Chile	2:01.19	+15.46
62	64	Carlos Font	Andorra	2:01.75	+16.02
63	65	Ahmet Kıbıl	Turkey	2:03.74	+18.01
64	73	Mümtaz Demirhan	Turkey	2:06.01	+20.28
65	71	Thomas Karadimas	Greece	2:14.69	+28.96
66	66	Spyros Theodorou	Greece	2:17.08	+31.35
-	60	Robin Armstrong	New Zealand	DNF	-
-	57	Mohammad Kalhor	Iran	DNF	-
-	51	Xavier Areny	Andorra	DNF	-
-	48	Adrián Roncallo	Argentina	DNF	-
-	26	Konrad Bartelski	Great Britain	DNF	-
-	23	Rob McIntyre	Australia	DNF	-
-	12	Anton Steiner	Austria	DNF	-
-	7	Erwin Stricker	Italy	DNF	-
-	72	Murat Tosun	Turkey	DNS	-

Source:^[1]

References

1. "Final Report - XII. Olympische Winterspiele Innsbruck 1976" (PDF). Organizing Committee for the XIIth Winter Olympic Games 1976. LA84 Foundation. 1976. Retrieved January 3, 2014.
2. "1975 World Cup standings". FIS. Retrieved January 3, 2014.
3. "1974 World Championships results". FIS. Retrieved January 3, 2014.
4. Johnson, William Oscar (16 February 1976). "On came the heroes". Sports Illustrated. p. 10.

External links

• Sports Reference – 1976 Olympic downhill