Andreas Ostler

Andreas "Anderl" Ostler (born January 21, 1921 in Grainau ; † November 24, 1988 there ) was a German bobsleigh driver who, with Lorenz Nieberl, became the first Olympic champion in Germany and also won gold in the four-man bobsleigh.

His first World Cup participation in Cortina in 1950 was canceled because his bobsleigh did not arrive on time. In 1951 , Ostler became double world champion at the Bobsleigh World Championships in L'Alpe d'Huez ( France ).

At the Olympic Winter Games in Oslo in 1952 , the Upper Bavarian and his brakeman Lorenz Nieberl won the gold medal in the two-man bobsleigh in a 17-year-old bobsled. This victory was the first Olympic gold in the Federal Republic of Germany (Germany was still banned in 1948), apart from his second gold in the four-man bobsleigh, only the figure skating couple Ria and Paul Falk won gold at these games .
When his four-man bobsled during training due to outdated pre-war technology behind the competition, which was equipped with better material, he persuaded his local arch-rival Friedrich Kuhn of Germany II to break up both teams and combine the heaviest men in one bob. That worked, Ostler, Nieberl, Kuhn and Franz Kemser (all SC Riessersee ) won gold in the four-man bobsleigh.

For this he was awarded the silver bay leaf on February 22, 1952 .

The crew of the German four-man bobsleigh at the Olympic Games weighed 472 kg, which prompted the International Federation to introduce a weight limit of 420 kg (without sled).

At the 1953 bobsleigh world championship on his home track in Garmisch-Partenkirchen , he was runner-up in the two-man and four-man bobsleigh, at the 1954 World Cup, Ostler, who was suffering from alcohol problems, did not appear at the World Championships.

Despite these problems, he was the flag bearer of the all-German team at the opening ceremony of the 1956 Olympic Games in Cortina d'Ampezzo ; but won nothing.

After his sports career, the passionate hobby folk musician Ostler became a restaurateur. His son Beni Ostler and his daughter Mathilde Ostler-Jochner continued the musical tradition of their father and were able to establish themselves successfully in the popular music scene in the 1970s.

The movie comedy Schwere Jungs by Marcus H. Rosenmüller from 2006 takes up the story of the 1952 Olympic bobsleigh team.

Web links

• Andreas Ostler in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )
• Daily mirror

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Report of the Federal Government to the German Bundestag - 7th electoral term - printed matter 7/1040 of September 29, 1973 -, Appendix 3, pages 54 ff., Here page 57. (Appendix 3 contains all awards of the Silver Laurel Leaf up to 1973.)
2. ↑ International Bobsleigh Regulations 2008. (PDF, 3.44 MB) (No longer available online.) FIBT, 2008, pp. 23–24 , formerly in the original ; Accessed on March 21, 2010 : “Minimum weight: sled including runners and without ballast and crew: two-man bobsleigh: 170 kg four-man bobsleigh: 210 kg Maximum weight: sled including crew, runners and equipment: two-man bobsleigh men: 390 kg four-man bobsleigh men: 630 kg women bobsleigh : 340 kg " 
3. ↑ on this also SPIEGEL 1957