Nino Bibbia

Nino Bibbia
nation	Italy
birthday	March 15, 1922
place of birth	Bianzone , Italy
date of death	May 28, 2013
Place of death	St. Moritz , Switzerland
Career
discipline	Skeleton ski jumping bobsleigh
Medal table
Olympic medals 1 × 0 × 0 ×
winter Olympics gold 1948 St. Moritz Skeleton singles

Nino Bibbia (born March 15, 1922 in Bianzone ; † May 28, 2013 in St. Moritz ) was an Italian winter sports enthusiast .

Athletic career

As a child, Bibbia moved with his parents from Bianzone in Italy to St. Moritz in Switzerland, 50 km away , where he attended school. He then ran a vegetable shop and also developed into a successful amateur winter sports enthusiast. In addition to the skeleton , bobsleigh , Nordic and Alpine skiing and ice hockey were among his strengths, although he said that he enjoyed the ski jumping practiced on the natural facilities in Arosa , Davos and Klosters the most.

Bibbia came to the Celerina Cresta race by chance . He was already successful in his first races and then bought his first Cresta bobsled for a box of Chianti , with which he was able to regularly defeat the British competition that dominated the Cresta sport of the time. After all, he won 232 Cresta races in his career. He was six times Cresta world champion. He was the most successful Cresta rider for over 30 years and is still considered the “King of the Cresta Run” today.

Bibbia wanted to compete in five disciplines at the 1948 Winter Olympics in St. Moritz. Due to the tight schedule, it was only enough for the bobsleigh and skeleton starts . In skeleton, he was Olympic champion and the second title holder in this discipline. The reason for this was that only once before, in 1928, the skeleton was in the program. The winner at the time was Jennison Heaton . His brother John Heaton competed in both 1928 and 1948 and won the silver medal both times. The real favorite, however, was John Crammond , who only achieved bronze. Since the competition was only held again in 2002, there were no further matches in the Olympic context. Bibbia was also the first Italian athlete ever to win a medal for the Azzurri at the Winter Olympics. He last drove in 1996 at the age of 73. In 1946 and 1951 he was - as an Italian - Swiss champion in luge .

Web links

• Nino Bibbia in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Nino Bibbia (91) is dead , blick.ch, May 28, 2013.
2. ^ Die Südostschweiz, May 30, 2013, p. 11.
3. ↑ Nino Bibbia died in Engadin at the age of 91 , suedostschweiz.ch, May 29, 2013.