Q&A with five-time overall champion Marc GirardelliMarc Girardelli won 46 alpine World Cup races, which is fourth-best on the men’s all-time list (behind only Ingemar Stenmark, Hermann Maier and Alberto Tomba). Issue 5 of Ski Racing magazine, coming soon to subscribers, takes a closer look at Marc Girardelli. After he retired, Girardelli invested in an indoor ski hall in Bottrop, Germany (Ski Racing is preparing a feature story on indoor ski racing). Since selling his shares in that venture, Girardelli has continued consulting with the German and Bulgarian ski teams, helping them to develop young skiers. He also has introduced a line of clothing that is on sale in areas as diverse as Moscow and Dubai. Marc Girardelli Ski Wear can be seen at Girardelli’s own Web site, www.marcgirardelli.com. The following Q and A is a combination of two interviews Girardelli gave to Nathaniel Vinton at Soelden, Austria, and Landgraaf, Holland.

Ski Racing: You are partly famous for all of the injuries you had over your career.
Marc Girardelli: Today even crossing the road is dangerous. I think crossing the road in New York is more dangerous than most of the downhills. And I think also it is everybody’s own decision what he is doing. Even a manager in the office can be hospitalized because of manager disease. That is the same risk of ruining the body and the mind than sport. But in the end I think in the end sport is more safe.

SR: But it hurts.
MG: If some normal person had the body damage I have, they would be half of the time in the hospital, because the limit of handling pain and problems of the body are completely different for someone who had sport as a profession. Someone who had sport professionally, he doesn’t care about knee that is not working perfect, or the pain in the back. That’s normal. That’s OK. A small pain in the back or in the foot is a big problem for that. I don’t even think about that.

SR: You have worked with nations like Bulgaria and Germany to get their young skiers on track.
MG: But with the youngsters in general nowadays it is a problem to give them the right attitude… I think they see training on the glacier more as a ski holiday than as professional training…You cannot have a goal of the season be to qualify for the second run. That cannot be a goal.

SR: You spend a lot of time in Germany. What do you think of Felix Neureuther, their only starter at Soelden?
MG: Felix Neureuther is a professional skier. His attitude is very good. He is young , just 21 years. He skied very good at the slalom and combined at Bormio. I think even in GS he has good chances to come close to the first seed this year in GS, and make really good results in slalom.

SR: You invested in an indoor ski center in Bottrop a few years ago. Do you think that has a big future for ski racing?
MG: I think it is a very good promotion for skiing and wintersport in general. In my center in Bottrop I had about 60 percent beginners, and 40 percent bad skiers. 700,000 clients a year. Most of the people who visited me would never have booked a winter holiday, but I think after they came several times to me for skiing, they got enough will and confidence to book a ski holiday.

SR: What do you think of Bode Miller?
MG: I think to the image of skiing, he made a big, big contribution. A big one. I think with a racer like Benni Raich, or Olympic champion Fritz Strobl, that’s a much smaller positive influence on World Cup skiing in general like Bode Miller did. That’s a big plus for the World Cup skiing the last few years since Bode arrived. He fails very often in slalom and even GS, because he risks 100 percent. If he has a run without any mistakes, and Benni Raich has a run without any mistakes, Bode is faster. That is in slalom, GS, in super G and in downhill.