Elan signs Wade Bishop to compete and Ingemar Stenmark to promote brand

Elan signs Wade Bishop to compete and Ingemar Stenmark to promote brand{mosimage}Ingemar Stenmark, the most successful World Cup skier of all time, has signed a new contract with Elan, promising to focus on ski promotion and brand development for the Slovenian company that provided Stenmark with equipment during his heyday.

Elan has also signed Wade Bishop, a speed specialist on the U.S. Ski Team’s B Team. Bishop, who had his first crack at the legendary Kitzbuehel track this season, is the second U.S. Ski Team athlete to recently make the jump to Elan. Last year, slalom ace Chip Knight signed on with the company. Three other World Cup athletes joining Elan this season are Finland’s Sami Uotila, and Slovenians Bernard Vajdic and Mitja Dragsic.

Elan partnered with Ingemar Stenmark when he dominated the World Cup with 86 victories. Despite the Swedish skier’s career-long rivalry with the Slovenian Bojan Krizaj, the two came together in the product testing and the presentation of Elan’s Revolutionary ski technology, Fusion. Krizaj currently heads up the international race department.

When Ingemar was only nine, he wrote in an essay that he would like to become a ski racer. His teacher found his dreams quite unrealistic and impossible to accomplish. Seven years later, Ingemar won his first World Cup race.

In the seventies he became one of World Cup’s biggest stars and it was with Elan’s skis that he finished with victory after victory. When he finished his career in 1989, he had entered 347 races and won an amazing 165 of them.

Stenmark’s other accomplishments include:
–Three overall World Cup titles
–Eight World Cup slalom titles
–Eight World Cup giant slalom titles
–Two Olympic gold medals
–Three world championship gold medals