Katja Seizinger

Skiing

No one is a bigger threat to Picabo Street in the Winter Olympics than Germany’s Katja Seizinger.

But Seizinger is going after a gold medal - not after Street.

“She isn’t a rival. I don’t know this word,” Seizinger said. “Sure, we are competitors on the hill, but we are all good friends beside the slope, and we all acknowledge and accept the achievements of the other racers. That is why there is good harmony on the entire circuit.”

Seizinger preceded Street as the World Cup downhill champion, reigning from 1992 through 1994. Street won the title the next two years, then her crash in Colorado and subsequent knee injury removed her from the competition.

Now Seizinger is on top again, dominating the World Cup as Street seeks a return to prominence in the Olympic floodlights.

She said the snowy weather and relatively flat downhill course at Hakuba will favor Street.

Seizinger plans to enter all five women’s Alpine events in the Nagano Games, the first time she has done that in her three Olympics.

“Why not?” she asked. “I am not tired. I am still young.”

Seizinger has been a World Cup success for so long it is easy to forget she is just 25, one year younger than Street.

She was 19 when she won her first World Cup downhill championship and the Olympic bronze medal in the super-G in Albertville. Two years later, in Lillehammer, she crashed in the super-G and giant slalom but won the gold medal in the downhill.

Now, she is at the top of her sport. She’s won eight World Cup races - four downhills and four super-Gs - so far this season, six of them in a row to tie a record held by Jean-Claude Killy.