Carlo Senoner

Carlo Senoner was the second youngest in a family of 12, and was given the opportunity to take up skiing at an early age. He won the national junior giant slalom title in 1958 and the following year was the European junior giant slalom champion. At the Squaw Valley Olympics in 1960, he was the youngest Italian contestant, yet he finished 13th in the slalom and 17th in the giant slalom. Senoner finished fourth in the combined at the 1962 World Championships at Chamonix. He was injured in the 1963 season, however, and thus missed the 1964 Olympics. He won just one Italian title, giant slalom in 1959, and enjoyed five more podium finishes between 1962-67.

Senoner’s greatest moment came in August 1966, high in the Andes at Portillo, Chile, when he conquered the world to became World Slalom Champion. He beat the French pair of Guy Périllat and Louis Jauffret, to become the first official Italian to win the World Slalom Championship, although Vittorio Chierroni had won it in 1941, but the results did not count because there were too few entrants. Senoner made his last appearance at the 1968 Grenoble Olympics and, upon retirement, established a hotel business in his native Selva di Val Gardena. He named his hotel “Hotel Chalet Portillo” (now called Hotel Portillo Dolomites) in honour of his world championship win in Chile.