Steggall, Zali (1975 - )

Zali Steggall was the first Australian to win an individual medal in the Winter Olympic Games.

Skiing from the age of five, Zali Steggall represented Australia at the Winter Olympic Games in Albertville in 1992, aged seventeen. She went on to compete at Lillehammer (1994), Nagano (1998), and finally Salt Lake City (2002) where she announced her retirement.

In 1997 at Park City, USA, Steggall became the first Australian woman to win a World Cup alpine event. The following year, in Nagano, Japan, she became the first Australian to win an individual Olympic medal, taking bronze in the slalom. She went on to win the World Championship skiing title in Vail, Colorado, in 1999. Steggall went to the Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City having finished in the top ten at World Cup level eleven times, twice on the podium.

Zali Steggall won the Australian Skier of the Year award for 1999. Chosen from 53 other nominations, she was inducted as a member of the Sport Australia Hall of Fame, only the second skier to receive the honour. In January 2007, Steggall was awarded a Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM) for service to alpine skiing, and to the community through support of a range of charitable groups.

Events

1998	Bronze Medalist at the Nagano Winter Olympics - Slalom Skiing

Australian Women Exhibitions

• She's Game: Women Making Australian Sporting History, Australian Women's Archives Project, 2007, http://www.womenaustralia.info/exhib/sg/sport-home.html. [ Details... ]

Newspaper Articles

• Pearlman, Jonathan, 'That's it for snow - Zali's going to wriggle her toes in the sand', Sydney Morning Herald (see http://www.smh.com.au/articles), 11 May 2002. [ Details... ]