Salzburg (pps) On February 11, 2002, almost eight million fans in Germany watched on their television sets Georg Hackl fighting for his fourth successive Olympic victory in the men’s luge in Salt Lake City, Utah, USA. However, in the end the most successful luger of all times had to be content with silver behind Italy’s Armin Zoeggeler after four dramatic heats. But in spite of that defeat, Georg Hackl, called „Hackl-Schorsch“ in his Bavarian home, made Olympic history.

The then 35-year-old from Berchtesgaden was the first winter sports athlete ever to gain a medal in five successive Olympic Winter Games. “My two silver medals frame my three gold medals”, Hackl describes his Olympic medal collection consisting of silver in 1988, three gold medals in 1992, 1994 and 1998, and silver in 2002.

It goes without saying that the three-time World champion, who wants to achieve his sixth Olympic medal at the 2006 Winter Games in Torino, is the most successful luger at Olym-pic Games. In the women’s event, that title is held by Steffi Martin-Walther of the former GDR with victories in Sarajevo (1984) and Calgary (1988). In the third Olympic luge disci-pline, the double-seater, the record champions are German Stefan Krausse and Jan Behrendt, who won two gold (1992, 1998) plus one silver (1988) and one bronze medal (1994) between 1988 and 1998.

Italian Paul Hildgartner achieved a special feat when he won the gold medal with his part-ner Walter Plaikner in the doubles at Sapporo, Japan, in 1972 and gold in the men’s sin-gle twelve years later in Sarajevo in 1984. Hans Rinn (GDR) gained two gold medals with his partner Norbert Hahn in the doubles (1976 and 1980) plus bronze in the single in 1976.

The doubles competition in Sapporo 1972 ended with two gold medals being awarded as the Italians Paul Hildgartner and Walter Plaikner shared first place with Horst Hoernlein and Reinhard Bredow of the GDR. It was the only time that two gold medals were awarded in an Olympic luge competition. Then the time was still measured by a hundredth of a second. Four years later, in Innsbruck, Austria, in 1976, the time was measured by a thousandth of a second for the first time at Olympic Winter Games. Luge is the only Olympic winter sport recording thousandths of a second.

In 1998, two thousandths of a second were the difference between the gold and the silver medal. German Silke Kraushaar thus had an advantage of just five centimetres after a total of 4,776 metres over her team-mate Barbara Niedernhuber when she won the gold medal in Nagano, Japan. It was the narrowest victory of all times in an Olympic luge competition.