Giorgio Rocca

Giorgio Rocca (born August 6,1975, Chur, Switzerland) is an Italian Alpine skier, a specialist of Slalom skiing. Together with Marc Girardelli and Ingemar Stenmark, he is the sole skier to have won 5 Alpine Skiing World Cup slalom in a row, a result he scored in the 2005/2006 season: only Alberto Tomba (7) made better. He is currently the fifth all-time slalom winner, with a total of 11 victories.__NOTOC__Rocca made his debut in the Alpine Skiing World Cup on January 6, 1996, at Flachau. However, Rocca broke his right knee and was forced to a one-year stop. In March 1997 he scored his first point result in the Cup, at the Shigakogen slalom. He was for the first time in the top ten in the November 1998, at the Aspen slalom.

One year later Rocca finally managed to be on the podium, scoring a third place in the renowned Kitzbühel slalom. In 1999 he won the bronze medal at the Alpine World Skiing Championships in Vail. Rocca began of course to be considered the legitimate heir of Italy's unrivalled champion of all-time, Alberto Tomba, who had just retired. This responsibility, however, seemed to crush Rocca and relented his evolution, together with another knee accident.

After two difficult seasons, in 2001 Rocca was again on the podium, with a second place in Aspen and Madonna di Campiglio. In January 2003, after another 2nd in the Sestriere slalom, Rocca finally won his first World Cup race in the Lauberhorn Run in Switzerland. In 2004 Rocca imposed definitively as a major force in the slalom race. In that season he obtained two victories at Chamonix and Flachau, and two bronze medals at the home World Championship at Bormio, in the slalom and the combined.

Rocca won again the February 2005, this time at Kranjska Gora, and raced for a while for the final victory in the Slalom World Cup.

Rocca started the 2005/2006 season with an impressive series of five wins a row in the first five slalom races. He explained his notable improvements from a psychological point of view, as he has taken advantage of the help of a team of psychologists to solve the alleged fragility that had thwarted him in the past seasons.

Rocca currently lives in Livigno.

He recited the Olympic oath at the 2006 Winter Olympics Opening Ceremony. It was at these Olympics that he was hoping to win gold in his strongest event: slalom, after his giant success in the world championship, so he decided to focus on this event and he did not enter the Giant Slalom or Super-G, which he was formerly going to, but did compete in the Combined race where he placed 5th and a total time of 3:10.74. At the Slalom he was the first person to start but with so much pressure on him as the favourite, he stradled at the second gate, throwing away his chances of being champion.

World Cup victories

Overall

Individual victories

References

* [http://www.fis-ski.com/uk/604/613.html?sector=AL&listid=&competitorid=51423&type=result FIS profile]
* [http://www.olympic.org/uk/games/past/index_uk.asp?OLGT=2&OLGY=2006 IOC 2006 Winter Olympics]
* [http://www.giorgiorocca.it Official website]