GARMISCH-PARTENKIRCHEN, Germany—Rosi Mittermaier, who won downhill and slalom gold medals at the 1976 Winter Olympics and narrowly missed a sweep of all three women’s Alpine skiing events at the Games, has died. She was 72.
German news agency dpa cited a statement from Mittermaier’s family that she died peacefully on Wednesday “following a serious illness.”
Mittermaier won West Germany’s only two gold medals at the 1976 Games in Innsbruck, Austria.
She nearly became the first woman to win three Alpine skiing gold medals at the same Olympics but missed out by .12 seconds to Canada’s Kathy Kreiner in the last event, the giant slalom, and took the silver. Nicknamed “Gold-Rosi” in Germany, Mittermaier also won the World Cup in 1976—becoming the first German to do so—before retiring at the end of the season aged 25….