Manfred Schmid (luge rider)

Manfred Schmid

nation

Austria

birthday

June 6, 1944

place of birth

Liezen , German Empire

size

180 cm

Weight

87 kg

Career

society

WSV Liezen

status

resigned

Medal table

Olympic medals	1 ×	1 ×
World Cup medals	1 ×	4 ×
EM medals	0 ×	1 ×

winter Olympics
gold	1968 Grenoble	singles
silver	1968 Grenoble	Double
Luge World Championships
silver	1967 Hammarstrand	Double
gold	1969 Königssee	Double
silver	1969 Königssee	singles
silver	1971 Olang	Double
silver	1975 Hammarstrand	singles
European Luge Championships
silver	1974 Imst	singles

Placements in the Luge World Cup

Podium placements	1.	2.	3.
Single seater	1	0	0

Manfred Schmid (born June 6, 1944 in Liezen , Styria ) is an Austrian Olympic champion in luge .

Career

The trained machine fitter began his international career at the age of 12 in 1957, when he set the fastest time for the first time in a toboggan race in Rottenmann in the presence of successful compatriots. At the European Junior Championships in 1960 he won with his partner Ernst Feldbaumer , two years later he repeated the title together with his partner Manfred Rohrer . Two years later, Schmid started at his first Olympic Winter Games in Innsbruck in 1964 and achieved ninth place in the single-seater after four runs.

At the Luge World Championships in Hammarstrand in 1967 , Schmid and his partner Ewald Walch won the silver medal in the two-seater behind the team from the GDR Klaus-Michael Bonsack and Thomas Köhler . In the same year he also won the two-seater race at the Austrian Grand Prix. After he became Austrian national champion in the doubles in 1968 and also won the Austrian Grand Prix with Walch, he won the gold medal in the singles and the silver medal in the doubles at the 1968 Winter Olympics in Grenoble .

Schmid came to the games as an amateur and took unpaid leave to take part. Despite changing weather conditions and very high air temperatures, he found his way around the Villard-de-Lans track and was always among the best in the training runs.

The day before the competition in the single seater, Manfred Schmid learned of his father's death. Nevertheless, he started the next morning and drove an outstanding best time in the first run, which was the basis for the later Olympic victory. He won the gold medal in front of the two East German luge athletes Thomas Köhler and Klaus-Michael Bonsack . For 50 years, his gold medal remained the only one of an Austrian in a single-seater - David Gleirscher was only able to end this dry spell in Pyeongchang 2018 .

Together with his partner Ewald Walch from Tyrol, he won the silver medal in the two-seater on the final day of the Winter Olympics behind Thomas Köhler and Klaus-Michael Bonsack, which Schmid and Walch had already narrowly beaten at the 1967 World Championships. After the games he received the honor ring of the city of Liezen for his successes.

At the Luge World Championships in 1969 on the combined artificial ice rink at Königssee , Schmid and Walch won his first world championship title in the two-seater and also won silver in the single-seater. In the same year Schmid also celebrated a first and a second place in the single-seater and two wins in the double-seater with partner Feistmantl in Lake Placid . At the Luge World Championships in Olang in 1971 , Schmid finished seventh in the single-seater and again won silver in the doubles. A year later at the 1972 European Luge Championships in Koenigssee, he was fifth in the singles and fifth in the doubles with his partner Walch.

At the 1972 Winter Olympics in Sapporo , Schmid finished seventh in a single and two-seater. At the 1973 Luge World Championships in Oberhof , Schmid was seventh in a two-seater with Reinhold Sulzbacher . Almost twelve months later at the 1974 Luge World Championships at Königssee, he was eighth in the single-seater and ninth in the doubles. At the Luge World Championships in 1975 he won silver in the single seater. He did not start in the two-seater. Before that, he had also won the silver medal in the single seater at the 1974 European Luge Championships . At the 1976 Winter Olympics in Innsbruck, he did not get past fifth place.

At the newly created Luge World Cup 1977/1978 , Schmid finished third in the overall single-seater standings after good performances at the end of the season, tied with German Gerhard Böhmer . Previously, he had just missed the medal ranks at the 1978 European Luge Championships in fourth place.

Schmid received the Golden Decoration of Honor in 1996 for services to the Republic of Austria .