Laureus Academy Member Franz Klammer: My Greatest Skiing Memory

With the Sochi Winter Olympics upon us, Skiing legend and Laureus Academy Member blogs exclusively for Laureus about his greatest skiing moment and who he thinks will emerge victorious on the slopes at Sochi 2014.

The Winter Olympics is always bringing back good memories for me.

What happened in Innsbruck in 1976 when I won the Gold Medal for downhill is my best memory from my skiing. I can still remember it so fresh in my mind. There is always a special feeling about the Olympics.

In Sochi we have some of the most amazing skiers taking part. Tina Maze had an unbelievable season last year. At the beginning of this season she was struggling, but now she won a race and it looks like she is going strong right for the Olympics. But it does not always work that the best skier wins a Gold Medal. She has a good chance because she has so many disciplines.

I hope she wins. She deserves a Gold Medal. And it is good that she does it for a small skiing country like Slovenia. But one should not forget about Mikaela Shiffrin from the US, she is the dominating slalom racer of this season.

For the men I really hope my country Austria do better than four years ago in Vancouver. There the men won only four medals, which is not good enough for a country like Austria with such a big Olympic history in winter sport.

With Hannes Reichelt injury Austria will be looking for Marcel Hirscher to win Gold Medal.

And maybe we could see a Norway winner Aksel Lund Svindal was brilliant in winning Super-G and Downhill World Cup and Downhill World Championship.