Erika Hess

This article describes the Swiss ski racer. For the German politician, see Erika Heß .

Erika Hess
nation	Switzerland
birthday	6th March 1962 (age 58)
place of birth	Wolfenschiessen , Switzerland
Career
discipline	Giant slalom , combination , slalom
status	resigned
End of career	1987
Medal table
Olympic games 0 × 0 × 1 × World championships 6 × 0 × 0 ×
winter Olympics bronze Lake Placid 1980 slalom  Alpine World Ski Championships gold Schladming 1982 Giant slalom gold Schladming 1982 slalom gold Schladming 1982 combination gold Bormio 1985 combination gold Crans-Montana 1987 combination gold Crans-Montana 1987 slalom
Placements in the Alpine Ski World Cup
Individual World Cup debut January 25, 1978  Individual world cup victories 31  Overall World Cup 1. ( 1981/82 , 1983/84 )  Giant Slalom World Cup 1. ( 1983/84 )  Slalom World Cup 1. ( 1980/81 , 1981/82 , 1982/83 , 1984/85 )  Combination World Cup 1. ( 1983/84 )
Podium placements 1. 2. 3.  Giant slalom 6th 9 5  slalom 21st 11 10  combination 4th 7th 3

Erika Hess (born March 6, 1962 in Wolfenschiessen ; resident in Engelberg ) is a former Swiss ski racer .

Career

In the 1980s, the versatile skier dominated alpine skiing among women, but she never achieved an Olympic victory in her career. She won the overall World Cup in 1982 and 1984 and won a total of 31 World Cup races. She also won 1981-1983 and in 1985 the discipline World Cup in slalom , beyond the 1984 World Cup in the giant slalom and the Alpine combined . In 1985/86, like Roswitha Steiner , she scored 110 points in the Slalom World Cup , but was ranked second due to the lower number of wins this season (2 versus 4). Her six wins in a row from January 1981 to the end of the season in March 1981 were also outstanding.

Hess was elected Swiss Sportswoman of the Year in 1982 and was awarded the Skieur d'Or by the International Association of Ski Journalists (AIJS) ; the award, which she won by 5 votes ahead of Phil Mahre , took place on November 22, 1982. During the 1982/83 season she underwent meniscus surgery. She had won the slalom in Piancavallo on December 17th , only left the two Super-Gs in Verbier on 9/10. January and finished second in the slalom in Davos on January 11th .

Hess won her only Olympic medal at the 1980 Winter Games in Lake Placid , the bronze medal in slalom (behind Hanni Wenzel and Christa Kinshofer ). She was more successful at the World Ski Championships . At the 1982 World Ski Championships in Haus im Ennstal, for example, she became three-time world champion in alpine combined, giant slalom and slalom. At the 1985 World Ski Championships in Bormio , she won the combination and was also in the lead after the first run of the slalom, before she was eliminated in the second run. At the end of her career, she won gold again in combined and slalom at the 1987 World Ski Championships in Crans-Montana .

On her resignation, she explained in an article in the newspaper Sport Zürich that an important reason for the end of her career, which was completed before Calgary in 1988, was the factors that existed at the Olympic Games, such as weather, hype, and nervous pressure, which at the Olympics are many times more severe than at one normal race. She was not able to cope with these circumstances.

Private

In 1988 she married Jacques Reymond , her former coach. The marriage produced three sons; Marco, the youngest, races in the European Cup and World Cup. The two lived in Saint-Légier-La Chiésaz in the canton of Vaud . Together they organized races and training camps for young ski racers. In May 2020, Reymond died at the age of 69 during the COVID-19 pandemic in Switzerland as a result of an infection with the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus .

Her cousin Monika Hess , who was two years her junior, was also a ski racer.

successes

Olympic games

• Lake Placid 1980 : 3rd slalom
• Sarajevo 1984 : 5th slalom, 7th giant slalom

World championships

• Garmisch 1978 : 9th giant slalom
• Schladming 1982 : 1st giant slalom, 1st slalom, 1st combination
• Bormio 1985 : 1st combination, 11th giant slalom
• Crans-Montana 1987 : 1st combination, 1st slalom, 7th descent

World Cup ratings

Erika Hess won the overall World Cup in the 1981/82 and 1983/84 seasons. In addition, there were six victories in discipline ratings (four times slalom, one giant slalom and one combination).

season	total		Departure		Super G		Giant slalom		slalom		combination
	space	Points	space	Points	space	Points	space	Points	space	Points	space	Points
1977/78	28.	7th	-	-	-	-	21st	1	16.	6th	-	-
1978/79	15th	76	-	-	-	-	10.	43	18th	33	-	-
1979/80	7th	111	-	-	-	-	5.	71	6th	62	-	-
1980/81	2.	251	34.	5	-	-	3.	78	1.	125	4th	51
1981/82	1.	297	35.	2	-	-	3.	105	1.	125	2.	77
1982/83	3.	192	-	-	-	-	4th	78	1.	110	4th	35
1983/84	1.	247	35.	5	-	-	1.	115	4th	89	1.	79
1984/85	4th	168	-	-	-	-	12.	48	1.	100	5.	44
1985/86	2.	242	25th	13	20th	12	7th	52	2.	110	2.	56
1986/87	4th	169	32.	3	18th	13	4th	62	3.	96	3.	15th

World Cup victories

Erika Hess has won a total of 31 world cup races (21 slaloms, 6 giant slaloms, 4 combinations). There are also 27 second places and 18 third places. In addition, she was victorious on November 23, 1982 in the giant slalom of Bormio in front of Perrine Pelen and Olga Charvátová in the World Series of Skiing, which is only part of the Nations Cup .

slalom date place country January 13, 1981 Schruns Austria January 21, 1981 Crans-Montana Switzerland January 31, 1981 Les Diablerets Switzerland 3rd February 1981 Zwiesel Germany March 15, 1981 Furano Japan March 24, 1981 Wangs - Pizol Switzerland December 13, 1981 Piancavallo Italy December 21, 1981 Saint-Gervais-les-Bains France January 3, 1982 Maribor Yugoslavia January 20, 1982 Bad Gastein Austria March 21, 1982 Alpe d'Huez France 17th December 1982 Piancavallo Italy February 9, 1983 Maribor Yugoslavia 1st December 1983 Kranjska Gora Yugoslavia January 15, 1984 Maribor Yugoslavia March 19, 1985 Park City United States March 22, 1985 Heavenly Valley United States December 15, 1985 Savognin Switzerland March 11, 1986 Park City United States 5th December 1986 Waterville Valley United States December 21, 1986 Val Zoldana Italy

Giant slalom date place country March 25, 1981 Wangs-Pizol Switzerland March 21, 1982 Alpe d'Huez France December 8, 1982 Val d'Isère France December 11, 1983 Val d'Isère France January 29, 1984 Saint-Gervais-les-Bains France March 17, 1984 Jasná Czechoslovakia combination date place country January 20, 1982 Bad Gastein Austria December 14, 1983 Sestriere Italy January 22nd 1984 Verbier Switzerland December 12, 1985 Sestriere Italy

Awards

• 1982: Swiss athlete of the year
• 1982: Skieur d'Or

literature

• Richard Hegglin: Erika Hess , Habegger, Derendingen 1982, ISBN 3-85723-186-6 .

Web links

• Erika Hess in the database of the International Ski Association (English)
• Erika Hess in the database of Ski-DB (English)
• Erika Hess in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )
• Erika Hess Open

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Steiner's incredible victory . In: Arbeiter-Zeitung . Vienna March 20, 1986, p. 22 ( berufer-zeitung.at - the open online archive - digitized version).
2. ^ Golden skier for Erika Hess . In: Arbeiter-Zeitung . Vienna November 24, 1982, p. 14 ( Arbeiter-zeitung.at - the open online archive - digitized).
3. ↑ Rank 6 instead of victory . In: Arbeiter-Zeitung . Vienna January 12, 1983, p. 12 ( berufer-zeitung.at - the open online archive - digitized).
4. ↑ "That's why I was afraid of the Olympics". Sport Zurich, February 22, 1988, p. 4.
5. ↑ Former ski trainer Jacques Reymond has died In: skinews.ch of May 8, 2020
6. ↑ And again Erika Hess . In: Arbeiter-Zeitung . Vienna November 24, 1982, p. 14 ( Arbeiter-zeitung.at - the open online archive - digitized).