Christoph Gruber

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Christoph Gruber Alpine skiing
Christoph Gruber in December 2006
Christoph Gruber in December 2006
nation AustriaAustria Austria
birthday 25th March 1976 (age 44)
place of birth Schwaz , Austria
size 180 cm
Weight 87 kg
Career
discipline Downhill , Super-G ,
giant slalom , slalom ,
combination
society Gymnastics Federation Schwaz
status resigned
End of career April 7, 2010
Medal table
Junior World Championship 2 × gold 0 × silver 0 × bronze
FIS Alpine Ski Junior World Championships
gold Voss 1995 Giant slalom
gold Voss 1995 combination
Placements in the Alpine Ski World Cup
 Individual World Cup debut November 27, 1998
 Individual world cup victories 5
 Overall World Cup 11. ( 2000/01 , 2001/02 )
 Downhill World Cup 9th ( 2004/05 )
 Super G World Cup 2. (2000/01)
 Giant Slalom World Cup 9th ( 2002/03 )
 Combination World Cup 7th (2004/05)
 Podium placements 1. 2. 3.
 Departure 0 1 1
 Super G 4th 3 2
 Giant slalom 1 0 2
 team 1 0 0
 

Christoph Gruber (born March 25, 1976 in Schwaz ) is a former Austrian ski racer who was particularly successful in the Super-G discipline , but also in downhill and giant slalom . He was two-time junior world champion in 1995 and won the overall European Cup in 2000. In his twelve seasons in the World Cup , he won five races. Gruber took part twice in the Winter Olympics and five times in the world championships . His best result was fourth place in the Super G at the 2007 World Cup.

biography

Even as a child, Christoph Gruber competed in ski races for his home club Turnerschaft Schwaz . He is a graduate of the Stams Ski School and has been a member of the Austrian Ski Association (ÖSV) since 1993 . The Tyrolean achieved his first major successes in the winter of 1994/95. At the end of February he became Austrian junior champion in giant slalom and Super-G, in early March he won his first European Cup race and shortly afterwards he became junior world champion in giant slalom and combined.

In the next two years, Gruber rarely made it into the top ten in the European Cup. In 1997 he became Austrian champion in combination. In the European Cup season 1997/98 he got three Super-G victories, with which he won the discipline classification and finished fourth in the overall ranking. Due to this success he had a World Cup fixed starting place in the Super-G next winter . Gruber made his World Cup debut on November 27, 1998 in Aspen , where he was 14th. He was also able to finish the next three races in the points and at the beginning of March he finished twelfth in Kvitfjell. In the European Cup this season he won the giant slalom in Hinterstoder and made it into the top three five more times. He finished third in the Super-G and giant slalom rankings as well as second in the overall classification. In the 1999/2000 season Gruber won the overall European Cup ranking with victory in the downhill from Les Orres (at the same time as Patrick Wirth ) and another six podium places. In the downhill he came in second and in the Super-G in third place overall. In the World Cup, his best result of the season was eleventh place in the giant slalom in Saalbach-Hinterglemm .

From the 2000/01 season on , Gruber only competed in the World Cup. His first top 10 result was sixth place in the Super-G of Lake Louise on November 26th, 2000. A week later he made his first podium in the Super-G of Beaver Creek , where he only beat Sweden's Fredrik Nyberg by just under three Was inferior to hundredths of a second. On December 21, 2000, the Tyrolean was on top of the podium for the first time with his victory in the giant slalom in Bormio . The second victory followed at the end of January 2001 in the Super-G in Garmisch-Partenkirchen , which he won by a hundredth of a second over compatriot Hermann Maier . He finished second behind Maier in the Super G World Cup and eleventh place in the overall standings. The results of the 2001 World Cup in St. Anton am Arlberg were rather disappointing for the Tyrolean. In the giant slalom he was second after the first run, but fell back to twelfth in the second run. He finished the Super-G in 19th place.

In the 2001/02 season Gruber remained without a podium. Two fourth places in the Super-G in Val-d'Isère and in the giant slalom in Alta Badia were his best results. He set a record in Alta Badia when he jumped 26 places from 30th place after the first round in the second round. With a total of eleven top 10 results, he came in eleventh place in the overall World Cup as in the previous year and in the top ten in the Super G and giant slalom rankings. The placements at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City corresponded to his season performance in the World Cup. In the giant slalom he was fifth, in the Super-G seventh and in the downhill twenty.

The 2002/03 season brought Gruber two podium places again. In the giant slalom in Val-d'Isère he finished third (again with a jump of 26 places after he was 29th in the first round) and in the Super-G in Kitzbühel in second place. At the 2003 World Championships in St. Moritz , however, he was only 14th in the Super-G. Ninth place in the Giant Slalom World Cup was his best overall result in this discipline. In the winter of 2003/04 , the Tyrolean also made it onto the podium twice. He finished third in the giant slalom in Adelboden and in the Super-G in Sestriere .

After a change of material in summer Gruber started the 2004/05 season with poor results . It wasn't until the turn of the year that he was back in the top ten and with second place in the Lauberhorn downhill run in Wengen , he finally joined the team for the 2005 World Cup in Bormio . There, however, he only contested the giant slalom, in which he no longer started after rank 37 in the first run in the second run. In the team's internal qualification for the downhill he could not prevail. After the disappointing World Cup, Gruber celebrated his first World Cup victory in four years on February 20, 2005. He won the Super-G in Garmisch-Partenkirchen with a hundredth of a second ahead of the Swiss Didier Défago . In the Downhill World Cup he achieved his best overall ranking with ninth place.

The 2005/06 season started again with weaker performances and Gruber never made it into the top 10 in the first few months. In the Super-G in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, however, he managed to win again, this time with an advantage of over eight tenths of a second over the American Scott Macartney . This secured him a place in the Super-G at the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin , where he only came in 19th. In the 2006/07 season , Gruber took the podium twice. He finished second in the Super-G of Val Gardena and third in the downhill at the season finale in Lenzerheide . At the 2007 World Championships in Åre , he narrowly missed the medal ranks. In the Super-G, he was a hundredth of a second behind the third-placed Swiss Bruno Kernen and, at the same time, fourth place with Didier Cuche . In the giant slalom he was eliminated in the first round, in the downhill he was not given a starting place.

In the 2007-08 season Gruber won the Whistler Super-G and he finished third in the Beaver Creek Super-G. In the discipline world cup he came in fifth. The 2008/09 season was quite disappointing. Sixth place in the giant slalom at the season opener in Sölden remained his best result and only once again made it into the top ten. At the 2009 World Championships in Val-d'Isère, he could not finish his only race, the downhill. In the overall World Cup he fell back to 54th place - by far his worst result in nine years - which is why he was transferred from the national team to the A-team of the ÖSV after the season.

In the following 2009/10 season , Gruber's best finish was an 18th place in the Super-G of Val-d'Isère. On January 16, 2010, he fell while driving in for the Wengen descent and suffered a severe concussion, a tear in the head of the shin, a torn cruciate ligament and a squeezed meniscus in his left knee. The season ended prematurely for him.

On April 7, 2010, Christoph Gruber announced the end of his sports career and wanted to work as a professional pilot in the future . He completed his training as a professional pilot in February 2012, and is also a co-commentator on several World Cup races for the television channel Eurosport . In addition to these activities, Gruber continues to work in the ski sector. As a ski instructor in a Tyrolean hotel, he passes on his knowledge and experience to children and adults as part of a race camp. He is supported by the trainer from Hubertus von Hohenlohe . Gruber has been married since May 9, 2009.

successes

Olympic games

World championships

World Cup ratings

season total Departure Super G Giant slalom combination
space Points space Points space Points space Points space Points
1998/99 71. 60 - - 22nd 60 - - - -
1999/00 75. 71 - - 43. 9 27. 62 - -
2000/01 11. 470 29 58 2. 246 12. 166 - -
2001/02 11. 477 23. 82 8th. 193 10. 202 - -
2002/03 14th 558 24. 96 6th 185 9. 227 9. 50
2003/04 15th 578 17th 200 11. 173 10. 181 20th 24
2004/05 13. 487 9. 242 12. 151 27. 58 7th 36
2005/06 23. 347 21st 111 9. 147 28. 54 19th 35
2006/07 17th 479 11. 242 7th 153 19th 71 36. 13
2007/08 12. 537 20th 149 5. 251 14th 137 - -
2008/09 54. 144 28. 64 33. 20th 30th 60 - -
2009/10 119. 15th 56. 2 42. 13 - - - -

World Cup victories

  • 14 podium places in individual races, including 5 wins
date place country discipline
December 21, 2000 Bormio Italy Giant slalom
January 28, 2001 Garmisch-Partenkirchen Germany Super G
February 20, 2005 Garmisch-Partenkirchen Germany Super G
January 29, 2006 Garmisch-Partenkirchen Germany Super G
February 21, 2008 Whistler Canada Super G

European Cup

  • Season 1994/95 : 5. Departure rating
  • Season 1997/98 : 4th place overall, first Super-G standings
  • Season 1998/99 : second overall, third super-G standings, third giant slalom rating
  • Season 1999/00 : first place overall, 2nd downhill standings, 3. Super-G standings
  • 17 podium places, including 6 wins:
date place country discipline
March 7, 1995 Saalbach-Hinterglemm Austria Departure
December 12, 1997 Obereggen Italy Super G
January 13, 1998 Altenmarkt-Zauchensee Austria Super G
January 25, 1998 Les Menuires France Super G
January 11, 1999 Hinterstoder Austria Giant slalom
January 26, 2000 Les Orres France Departure

Junior World Championships

  • Voss 1995 : 1st giant slalom, 1st combination, 5th descent, 19th slalom

Austrian championships

Records

Gruber held the record for the biggest leap forward in the second round of a technical competition - by 26 places each in the giant slalom of Alta Badia 2001 from 30th to 4th place and that of Val-d'Isère 2002 from 29th 3rd place. The record was surpassed in 2008 by Frenchman Gauthier de Tessières with a jump from 30th to 3rd place, also in the giant slalom of Val-d'Isère.

Web links

Commons : Christoph Gruber  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Matteo Pacor: Biggest jump in the 2nd run. ski-db.com, accessed December 26, 2017 .
  2. ↑ Another setback from injury. sport.orf.at, January 19, 2010, accessed on January 19, 2010.
  3. ↑ Christoph Gruber becomes a professional pilot. Tages-Anzeiger , April 7, 2010, accessed April 21, 2016 .
  4. ↑ News on Christoph Gruber's website, last accessed on October 2, 2012.
  5. ↑ Skiing-in-Tirol-with-professionals , accessed on January 10, 2014.
personal data
SURNAME Gruber, Christoph
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian ski racer
DATE OF BIRTH March 25, 1976
PLACE OF BIRTH Schwaz , Austria