Lasse Kjus biography
Lasse Kjus, (born Jan. 14, 1971, Oslo, Nor.), Norwegian Alpine skier who overcame a sequence of medical issues to change into one of many world’s most constant skiers within the late Nineteen Nineties and early 2000s.
Kjus took up snowboarding at age seven, and his first coach was Finn Aamodt, the daddy of his pal Kjetil Andre Aamodt. In 1990 both Kjus or the youthful Aamodt, by then roommates, gained each title on the world junior championships. The following 12 months Kjus fell whereas coaching, severely injuring his shoulder. which stored him from competitors for months. After Kjus joined Norway’s nationwide group, his early successes got here within the mixed occasion; he was the world champion in 1993 and the Olympic champion in 1994 at Lillehammer, Nor. Aamodt, nevertheless, gained the general 1994 World Cup title.
Two years later, after beginning the season with nice success, Kjus had a crash in Kitzbühel, Austria, that sidelined him for 3 weeks, however he recovered to win the season’s ultimate downhill race (at Lillehammer) and captured the 1996 total World Cup title. Frequent sickness, nevertheless, led Kjus to hunt medical consideration in 1997, and medical doctors decided that he had a congenital nasal situation that required surgical procedure. Despite that setback, he made historical past on the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano, Japan, by capturing a silver medal within the downhill and later the identical day profitable one other silver within the mixed—the primary Alpine skier to medal twice in someday.
Plagued once more by illness, Kjus missed out on essential point-producing races at the beginning of the 1998–99 season and sat out one other six races late within the season. A defining second got here in February 1999, nevertheless, on the world championships in Vail, Colo. He tied Austrian star Hermann Maier for the gold within the opening occasion—the super-G—then triumphed over Maier within the big slalom. When the championships ended, Kjus had gained a document 5 medals. On the final day of the season, in Sierra Nevada, Spain, Kjus went face to face with Aamodt (they'd stopped rooming collectively the 12 months earlier than). Although neither skied significantly properly, Kjus picked up sufficient factors to win by solely 23—one of many closest finishes in historical past—for his second total World Cup title.
Kjus added to his Olympic medal complete in Salt Lake City, Utah, in 2002 when he captured silver within the males’s downhill and bronze within the big slalom. He additionally gained a silver medal within the mixed occasion on the 2003 world championships, ending simply .07 seconds behind American Bode Miller. While Kjus competed on the 2006 Olympic Games in Turin, Italy, he didn't medal. Kjus retired from aggressive snowboarding following the 2006 season, after which he targeted on selling his signature line of ski attire.