Barbara Niedernhuber

Barbara Niedernhuber at the World Cup race in Altenberg 2015.

Barbara "Babsi" Niedernhuber (born June 6, 1974 in Berchtesgaden ) is a former German luge athlete .

The "eternal" second (or third) named athlete of the WSV Königssee won the silver medal at the Olympic Games in 1998 and 2002 and at the World Championships in 1999 , 2000 , 2004 and 2005 , and she also won the World Championships in 2001 and 2003 as well as the European Championships 2000 and 2002 bronze. At the 2004 World Cup, she won her only World Cup gold medal in the team competition with David Möller , Patric Leitner and Alexander Resch . In the 2004/2005 season she was the overall winner of the Luge World Cup. With 66 starts in the Luge World Cup, Niedernhuber celebrated five wins, three of them in the 2004/05 season alone.

On May 6, 2002, she was honored for her athletic achievements by being awarded the Silver Laurel Leaf .

Along with Sylke Otto and Silke Kraushaar , she was one of the "big three" who almost single-handedly ensured that the German female luge athletes remained undefeated internationally since 1996. One reason for their great success was the technical support from the German men's luge legend Georg Hackl , who was considered a great tinkerer and technician among the tobogganists.

At the end of September 2006, after almost a decade at the top of the world, Niedernhuber surprisingly ended her career. Due to an operation due to an injury to her right foot ( ankle splintering at the ankle ), the 32-year-old at the time would not have gotten fit at the start of the season, so she would not have been able to get a place on the German World Cup team. After her career, she begins training in the senior police service of the Federal Police . Already in 2005/06 their injuries had been tampered with, the participation in the Olympic Winter Games of Turin had prevented.

successes

Overall World Cup

season	space	Points
1996/97	0?.	0?
1997/98	0?.	0?
1998/99	03.	0488
1999/2000	03.	0490
2000/01	06th	0351
2001/02	03.	0410
2002/03	03.	0525
2003/04	03.	0490
2004/05	01.	0636
2005/06	010.	0260

World Cup victories

Single seater	Team relay
No. date place train 1. 0Dec 7, 1997  innsbruck Igls artificial ice rink bobsleigh 2. Nov 28, 1998  Altenberg Altenberg racing sled and bobsled run 3. 0Dec 4, 2004  Lake Placid Olympic bobsleigh track Lake Placid 4th Dec 12, 2004  Calgary Bobsleigh and sled run in Canada Olympic Park 5. 0Jan. 2, 2005  Oberhof Oberhof luge track	No. date place train 1. 0Jan. 6, 2005  Koenigssee Combined artificial ice rink at Königssee

Web links

• Barbara Niedernhuber in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )
• Brief portrait on the BSD website

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Press release of the Federal President's Office of May 6, 2002 on the occasion of the award of the Silver Laurel Leaf to the medal winners of the 2002 Winter Olympics In: bundespraesident.de: Der Bundespräsident / Speeches / Greetings