A Nice Guy Who May Finish First

Phil Mahre has a chance to become the world's best skier

What astonishes his European rivals is that he can be so good and still have so much fun. When he comes slashing down a mountainside, weaving expertly through the slalom gates, the handsome young man from White Pass, Wash., is obviously having a marvelous time. He skis, as one leading foreign coach puts it, "for sheer joy, unlike the Europeans, who often are driven by political, nationalistic or commercial pressures." At the age of 20, with his best years just ahead, Phil Mahre (pronounced mare) is already the finest American male skier in history, a solid gold-medal prospect for the 1980 Winter Olympic Games in Lake Placid, N.Y. As the World Cup competition ends this week in Arosa, Switzerland, Mahre is second only to Sweden's Ingemar Stenmark, 22, who has won the overall championship three years in a row.

Mahre's success reflects the growing strength of the U.S. alpine team, which just two years ago won only a bronze medal at the Innsbruck Olympics. After that debacle, the team's annual budget was doubled, to $600,000, and its staff of coaches increased from half a dozen to 14. "With that kind of organizational and financial stability," says Alpine Ski Team Director Hank Tauber, "I can finally lay out ten-month racing and training programs and prepare younger racers as well." This year the American team trails only those of Austria and Switzerland in World Cup points, a heady jump from a seventh-place finish one year ago.

World Cup competition, ski racing's big league, is a 22-event road show that stretches from Stratton, Vt., to Vald'Isere, France; a traveling extravaganza complete with glamour and groupies, danger and drama. The life-style is a world away from what goes on back in Phil Mahre's home town of White Pass, nestled in the Cascade Mountains. Its total population is 27, and nine belong to the Mahre household, including Steve, Phil's twin, who is himself a promising member of the U.S. ski team.

What White Pass lacks in glitter it makes up in snow--the hamlet was created by a ski club--and Phil and Steve began skimming down the slopes at the age of seven. As they developed, they became their own best coaches. Then, at 16, Phil suffered a setback when a freak avalanche buried him to the waist and broke his right leg. One year later he fractured the leg a second time while clowning around on a children's slide. Within 18 months, however, Mahre had recovered sufficiently to place a respectable fifth in the giant slalom in Innsbruck.

From the beginning, the Mahre brothers have taken a casual attitude toward training, which was encouraged by their father. While most World Cup competitors were practicing year round, the Mahres switched to motorcycle racing, water-skiing and backpacking during their summers. Last year they spent their time off building a hydroplane.

"I have always skied for my own enjoyment, and that's the way it is today," insists Phil. Perhaps, but with the Olympics coming up, Phil will forgo his summer respite this year and submit to off-season training in South America and Europe. "I'm really hungry now," he confesses.

Stenmark, the man Mahre must beat, is a fluid, powerful racer, who trains constantly, shuns the limelight and is so dedicated that, says Swedish Coach Hermann Nogler somewhat ruefully, "he does not smoke, drink, dance, womanize--in short, he has no private life." Known as the Silent Swede to his rivals, Stenmark is considered to be a dour curmudgeon on the circuit, but he and the ebullient Mahre get along fine and often train together. Says Mahre of his rival: "He is shy and does not like to speak English, but I feel comfortable with him. He is really a fantastic skier, especially on a steep course. He changes edges like nobody else." Even so, Mahre has beaten Stenmark through the gates in four of their last five races.

In the months ahead, building to a climax at the Games in Lake Placid, their friendship is likely to be tested as their rivalry grows. Stenmark, says Mahre, "has always made less mistakes than the others. He would always say, 'I set the pace, now you guys beat me.' Well, we may do just that." The pleasant young man from White Pass is too polite to say "I."

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