Sailer, Anton

Anton Sailer, byname Toni Sailer, (born Nov. 17, 1935, Kitzbühel, Austria—died Aug. 24, 2009, Innsbruck), Austrian Alpine skier who, in the 1956 Olympic Winter Games held in Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy, was the first to sweep the gold medals in the Alpine competition, which at that time consisted of the slalom, giant slalom, and downhill events. His gold-medal feat has been matched only by French skier Jean-Claude Killy.

Sailer, a 20-year-old plumber, was the youngest skier ever to win a gold medal in men’s Olympic Alpine skiing. At the 1956 Games, Sailer first won the giant slalom by more than six seconds and then the slalom by four seconds. Only the downhill event remained. On the day of the competition the weather was brutal and the course treacherous; more than a third of the starters were unable to complete the race owing to gusty winds and an icy course, and eight required medical attention. Sailer himself narrowly recovered from a near fall and came in three and a half seconds ahead of Switzerland’s Raymond Fellay to claim the gold medal sweep. Sailer’s fans began to refer to him as the “Blitz from Kitz,” playing on the name of his hometown of Kitzbühel. Winning the gold medals also meant that Sailer received three world championship titles and also a world champion classification for the combined event. By the end of the 1958 season, he had won an impressive seven world titles.

In 1959 Sailer announced his retirement from amateur competition and said that he would not be participating in the 1960 Olympic Winter Games. Since 1957 he had worked as a movie actor and now felt that his film career left him little time to train for the Olympics. Sailer’s retirement came just days before the International Ski Federation was to rule on his disputed amateur status owing to his work as an actor and a model. He later rejoined the Austrian Alpine ski team as manager in the early 1970s.