| Women's downhill at the X Olympic Winter Games | |||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 | |||||||||||||
| Venue | Chamrousse | ||||||||||||
| Date | February 10 | ||||||||||||
| Competitors | 39 from 14 nations | ||||||||||||
| Winning time | 1:40.87 | ||||||||||||
| Medalists | |||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||
| Alpine skiing at the 1968 Winter Olympics | ||
|---|---|---|
 | ||
| Downhill | men | women |
| Giant slalom | men | women |
| Slalom | men | women |
| Women's Downhill | |
|---|---|
| Location | Chamrousse |
| Vertical | 602 m (1,975 ft) |
| Top elevation | 2,252 m (7,388 ft) |
| Base elevation | 1,650 m (5,413 ft) |
The Women's Downhill competition of the Grenoble 1968 Olympics was held at Chamrousse on Saturday, 10 February. [1] [2]
The defending world champion was Marielle Goitschel of France, who was also the defending World Cup downhill champion and Austria's Olga Pall led the current season. [3] [4] Christl Haas of Austria was the defending Olympic champion.
Pall won the gold medal, Isabelle Mir of France took the silver, and Haas was the bronze medalist. [5] [6]
The starting gate was at an elevation of 2,252 m (7,388 ft), and the vertical drop was 602 m (1,975 ft). [1] The course length was 2.160 km (1.34 mi) and Pall's winning time of 100.87 seconds resulted in an average speed of 77.089 km/h (47.9 mph), with an average vertical descent rate of 5.968 m/s (19.6 ft/s).
About an hour before the race, eighteen-year-old American Karen Budge was testing her wax on the practice course and narrowly avoided a full collision with a member of the Moroccan men's team, Said Housni, who had been warned once before to stay off the hill. She fell, suffered a dislocated shoulder, and did not start. [5] [7]
