Alpine Canada tabs Gartner to lead 2010 Own the Podium initiatives

By Published On: August 1st, 2006Comments Off on Alpine Canada tabs Gartner to lead 2010 Own the Podium initiatives

Alpine Canada tabs Gartner to lead 2010 Own the Podium initiatives{mosimage}CALGARY, Alberta — Alpine Canada Alpin President Ken Read has named Max Gartner to lead the organization’s Own the Podium initiatives designed to make Canada a leading ski racing nation by 2010, when Vancouver hosts the Olympic Winter Games.

As ACA director for Own the Podium projects, Gartner will spearhead multiple efforts already under way, including enhanced training and several technically advanced initiatives that form part of Canada’s research programs designed to create a competitive edge.

“Max is the ideal expert who can seek every possible advantage to make Canada’s racers medal winners when the Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games are held in their home country,” Read said. “In a highly competitive sport where the blink of an eye is the difference between fourth place and mounting the podium, Max knows how to create winners.”

The appointment is part of organizational changes designed to bolster efforts to make and sustain Canada as a world-leading alpine ski racing nation by 2010.

“We want our athletes on the podium in 2010, and this new position permits Alpine Canada Alpin to focus resources and initiatives where they can impact results,” Gartner said. “As director of Own the Podium projects, I will direct efforts to find every edge possible for our Canadian alpine racers.”

Gartner returned to Alpine Canada Alpin in 2002 to the new position of vice president of Canadian development programs. He later became the organization’s chief athletics officer.
 
Under his guidance last season, Canadian alpine racers won 12 World Cup medals — twice as many as the previous season — and Canada recorded the country’s highest total point count ever in the Nations Cup standings. Ranked 12th in the world in 2002, Canada currently is ranked sixth.

Born in Linz, Austria, Gartner has been a ski coach in Canada for 20 years. He was head coach of the Canadian women’s technical team, manager of the men’s speed team and technical director for Alberta Alpine.

Among his successes are the 1992 Olympic gold medal of his wife, Kerrin Lee-Gartner, and helping to develop Alberta team racers Edi Podivinsky and Cary Mullen, who both went on to become World Cup champions.

— ACA

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