Hermann Maier

Hermann Maier grew up in Flachau, an Austrian ski village where his parents ran a ski school. At 15 he was sent home from the national ski academy at Schladming because he was too small and too light and his knees were a problem. He trained as a bricklayer and worked on building sites in summer and as a ski instructor in winter, racing in local events when he could. He was in his mid-twenties before the national team took him seriously, by which time he was built like the labourer he had been.

At the Nagano Olympics in 1998 he lost control in the downhill at over 100 kilometres an hour, flew off the course, cartwheeled through two safety fences and lay still. He got up. Three days later he won the super-G, and three days after that the giant slalom.

In August 2001, riding his motorcycle home from training, he was hit by a car. His right leg was crushed and surgeons discussed amputating it. He was left with a leg held together by metal, and he missed the Salt Lake City Olympics. Eighteen months after the crash he won a World Cup super-G at Kitzbühel, and in 2004 he won his fourth overall World Cup title.

He retired in 2009 with 54 World Cup wins, the Herminator to a generation of Austrian fans.