Zali Steggall

Zali Steggall

Personal information
Born	(1974-04-16) 16 April 1974 Manly, New South Wales, Australia
Education	Griffith University
Height	172 cm (5 ft 8 in)
Weight	125 kg (276 lb)
Website	Official website
Sport
Sport	Alpine skiing
Medal record Alpine skiing Representing Australia Winter Olympics 1998 Nagano Slalom World Ski Championships 1999 Vail Slalom

Zali Steggall, OAM (born 16 April 1974) is an Australian lawyer and former Olympic athlete. She is Australia's most internationally successful alpine skier, winning a bronze medal in slalom at the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano, and a World Championship gold medal in 1999. She is Australia's first and so far only medalist in alpine skiing, first individual medalist for Australia and Australia's first female medalist. Steggall's long Olympic career extended from Albertville in 1992 to Salt Lake City in 2002. She is a candidate in the 2019 federal election.

Early life

Born in Manly, New South Wales, in 1974, she and her family lived in France from 1978 until 1989, and she started ski racing while living there, at the ski resort of Morzine in the French Alps. Her parents had intended to stay for only 18 months, but they liked the lifestyle so much that they stayed. Her mother, Dr. Susan Steggall, documented these ten years in Alpine Beach. A Family Adventure. Steggall came from a sporting family; her grandfather Jack Steggall played ten Tests for Australia in rugby union. Her father played rugby for Northern Suburbs, Manly Rugby Club and Manly Lifesavers. She and elder brother Zeke grew up on the snow. Zeke was a champion snowboarder who enjoyed more international success that his sister. Steggall won European age championships at the age of 10 and 13, improved to be a member of the French junior skiing team at the age of 14. Her parents wanted to stay in France so Steggall and her brother could compete for the French skiing team, but the pair were not selected, so the family returned to Australia. Steggall was educated for 18 months in Sydney at the Queenwood School for Girls following the family's return to Australia in 1989.

Skiing career

Despite moving back to Australia, the Steggall siblings regularly travelled to the northern hemisphere to train. She was also sent overseas by the Australian Ski Institute to train under Austrian alpine coach Helmut Spiegl.

Steggall was selected to make her Olympic debut in Albertville in 1992, at the age of 17. She left school in Year 12 without completing, to compete in the Games. She came 23rd out of 44 entries in the giant slalom event, and failed to finish the slalom or the combined event. At the 1994 Olympics in Lillehammer, the size of the field was scaled back. Steggall came 22nd out of 28 athletes in the slalom and 24th and last in the giant slalom. She withdrew from the super-G and was unplaced in the overall standings.

In December 1995, Steggall broke into the top 10 in a World Cup event for the first time, placing 10th in the slalom event at Sankt Anton. In January 1996, Steggall came fourth at the World Championships in Sestriere, Italy, missing bronze by just 0.04 s.

Steggall came into the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano as one of the medal favourites. Three months earlier, she had become the first Australian woman to win a World Cup event in alpine skiing, after winning the slalom event at Park City, Utah She then came fifth, sixth and tenth in the next three World Cup events to be ranked sixth in the world. Steggall's success in the coveted FIS Alpine World Cup was limited. With the exception of slalom, Steggall was unable to ski effectively across the various alpine events. Steggall won a second tier Europa Cup event at Piancavallo. She won a bronze in slalom skiing at Nagano in 1998. Her time of 1 m 32.67 s was 0.27&nbsp behind the gold and silver medalists, who were only .06sec apart. The gold medalist, Germany's Hilde Gerg easily took gold after losing control and having a near fall. Steggall took 45.96 s on her first run and 46.71 s on the second. In December, Steggall placed second in a World Cup event at Mammoth Mountain, missing the gold medal by 0.01 s to Anja Pärson. She had earlier placed seventh at Park City. This marked the end of Steggall's short-lived success in the FIS Alpine World Cup.

Steggall's relative international success and lobbying prompted the Australian Olympic Committee to expand the Australian Ski Institute into the Olympic Winter Institute of Australia. It was given a million-dollar annual budget and for the first time, Australia had a federal government-funded full-time training program to accompany the Australian Institute of Sport. It operated in six sports and supported 37 athletes and resulted in an immediate upturn in results with numerous athletes going on to win gold for Australia across the winter sport disciplines.

In 1999, Steggall won the slalom event at the World Championships held in Vail, Colorado, in the United States. Following the Championships, Steggall fired her coach Helmut Spiegl, despite the fact that he had set the course on which she won at Vail that year. That was her last podium finish at global level. In February 2000, she came 10th at Aare,Sweden the last top-10 result in her career.

Steggall's relative international success was short lived. Her career ended abruptly at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City. She failed to complete her first run and was eliminated.

Steggall was part of the Sydney Olympic torch relay in September 2000, carrying the Olympic flame along the pathway of Olympians in Manly and on the Manly ferry to Circular Quay. In 2004, she was part of the Athens Olympic torch relay, carrying the Olympic flame up the Sydney Harbour Bridge and handing over to Kieren Perkins.

Post skiing career

Steggall retired in 2002 after the Olympics. She completed a BA in Communications and Media Studies from Griffith University and then studied Law through the Legal Practitioners Admissions Board while working for her father's legal practice, Roper & Steggall, in Manly, as a receptionist. She also worked as a receptionist at a Sydney barrister's chambers. She was then admitted to the NSW Bar as a Barrister in 2008. Her principal areas of practice as a Barrister were family law and sports law. Elected by her peers, Steggall served as councillor to the NSW Bar Association and Chair of its Health, Sports and Recreation Committee for three years as an under-5 year barrister. She was not re-elected.

Steggall is currently an Independent Non-Executive Director, Olympic Winter Institute of Australia; Director, Sport Australia Hall of Fame; Member of the Australian Sports Anti Doping Agency (ASADA) Anti Doping Rule Violation Panel. She was appointed as arbitrator of Court of Arbitration for Sport in January 2017. She was one of the 12 world-wide arbitrators appointed to Ad Hoc Tribunal of CAS for the Pyeongchang Winter Olympic Games. While there she was appointed to the tribunal of arbitrators to hear an urgent application by 15 Russian athletes and coaches (the Applicants) against the International Olympic Committee (IOC) (the Respondent). The Applicants challenged the IOC decision refusing to invite them to participate in the 2018 Olympic Winter Games. They requested that CAS overturn the IOC decision and allow them to participate in these Games as Olympic Athletes from Russia. Many critics of the decision believe that Steggall's tribunal failed to consider the important issue of the tribunal's jurisdiction to entertain the Applicants' claims, which was the basis for the second decision to dismiss the application to a separately constituted CAS tribunal on the same issue, by a further group of Russian athletes, at the 2018 Winter Games, only a few days later.

In 2000, Steggall appeared semi-nude for a Pear Industry campaign dubbed O'Pear. Steggall also appeared in Penthouse Black Label Magazine in October 1998 and in Inside Sports posing in lingerie in August 1995

Politics

On 26 January 2019, Steggall announced her candidacy as an independent in the Division of Warringah in the 2019 Australian federal election, running against former Australian Prime Minister and incumbent Liberal MP Tony Abbott.

Personal life

In 2008, Steggall married marketing executive Tim Irving, 11 years her senior. The pair met while Irving was working at the Manly Sea Eagles Leagues Club in 2005. The pair have no children together.

Honours

Steggall received an Australian Sports Medal in 2000 and a Medal of the Order of Australia in 2007. She was inducted into the Australian Institute of Sport 'Best of the Best' in 2001 and the Sport Australia Hall of Fame in 2004.

See also

• Skiing in Australia

References

• Andrews, Malcolm (2000). Australia at the Olympic Games. Australian Broadcasting Corporation. ISBN 0-7333-0884-8.
• Gordon, Harry (1994). Australia and the Olympic Games. University of Queensland. ISBN 0-7022-2627-0.
• Gordon, Harry (2003). The time of our lives: inside the Sydney Olympics : Australia and the Olympic Games 1994–2002. University of Queensland. ISBN 0-7022-3412-5.
• The Compendium: Official Australian Olympic Statistics 1896–2002. Australian Olympic Committee. ISBN 0-7022-3425-7.

External links

• List of results at skidb.com
• News report on her World Championship slalom victory
• speaker's information – source of some biographical information