On Saturday the 11th of January it is time again: Then on the program is the giant slalom of the men in the Swiss Adelboden. After four of seven giant slalom of the season the Austrian Marcel Hirscher leads the special stage before Ted Ligety from USA and Alexis Pinturault France. The Germans Stefan Luitz and Fritz Dopfer are on fifth and sixth place and Felix Neureuther is 13th.
Not so bad prospects for Eberhard „Ebs“ Riedel, to continue with his special record on the 11th of January 2014 – those, who has triumphed as the first and only German on the „Chuenisbärgli“ in giant slalom, at that time in 1961 under the flag of GDR.  

His final time for the 2.2 km long and exhausting distance of 2.32,1 minutes could not be beaten by anyone. With start number  seven it was Roger Staubs, the Swiss Olympic champion in  Squaw Valley, turn, and Riedel would have never thought that he could beat him. After all, the confederate had completed this winter already some high-class competitions, for example, in Val d'Isere. But in Adelboden Staub was clearly in a disadvantage. He was 7.8 seconds behind the East German. (...) After remaining driver to driver behind Riedel, and many of them noted in the target slope the rigors of the track, not only he concentrated on the start number 30, on the immensely powerful Swiss Willy Forrer. (...) The Toggenburger  struggled with a splendid performance down and saw the finishing flag 1.3 seconds behind Riedel  in second place. Years later Forrer told as he would have Riedel perceived as "visually inconspicuous, small but very good athlete". "Certainly we have thought that another one would win, a West German or Austrian or Italian or Swiss, but Riedel has driven down very very well - and for this he has also been highly respected. It has not been called, well, wins just an East German." (from: "Spuren des Erfolgs" by Eberhard und Peter Riedel, 2013)

„This was a special time and a special day“, the Oberwiesenthaler remembers back. „My coach Joachim Loos could not believe that I had won - but he had explained the strategy for victory: full attack in the upper section and precise lines at the bottom. “ The fact that the three-time Olympian Riedel, who turns during the Games in Sochi in February 76, will not miss the race, is clear. „But I follow the whole Ski World Cup with great interest“, he says. „Of course, I would be pleased if my record would exist even longer. For the German skiing on the other hand I hope that as soon as possible a successor for me can be found in Adelboden.“
Book tip: 2013 released Eberhard with his son Peter in egoth-publisher Vienna (www.egoth.at) the  biography „Spuren des Erfolgs“. ISBN 978-3-902480-79-8; € 19,90