Katarina Witt

Katarina Witt (born December 3, 1965) is a German figure skater. In Germany she was commonly called "Kati" in the past, but today her full name is used more often.

She won two Olympic gold medals for East Germany, first in the 1984 Sarajevo Olympics and the second in 1988 at the Calgary Olympics. She won the World Championships in 1984, 1985, 1987, and 1988, and six consecutive European Championships (1983–1988). Her competitive record makes her one of the most successful figure skaters of all time.

Witt was born in Staaken in then East Germany, just outside of West Berlin, which is today part of Berlin. She went to school in Karl-Marx-Stadt (which today has reverted to its pre-war name of Chemnitz). There she attended a special school for athletically talented children named Kinder- und Jugendsportschule. She represented the club SC Karl-Marx-Stadt for the GDR (East Germany). Jutta Müller began coaching her in 1977.

In 1984, Witt was voted "GDR female athlete of the year" by the readers of the East German newspaper Junge Welt. She narrowly won the 1984 Olympic title over the favored contender, reigning World champion Rosalynn Sumners of the United States. Witt and Sumners held the top two spots heading into the Olympic free skate, which were worth 50% of the total score. Witt landed three triple jumps in her free skate program, and the judges left room for Sumners to win the event, but Sumners scaled back two of her jumps, and Witt won the long program by one tenth of a point on one judge's scorecard.

In 1987, Witt recaptured the World Championship title, which she had lost the previous year to Debi Thomas. Witt only finished fifth in compulsory figures, which meant that Thomas could finish second in both the short and long programs and still retain the world title. However, a costly error by Thomas in the short program put the two skaters on a level playing field heading into the free skate. Witt skated the strongest long program of her career, landing five triple jumps, including a triple loop jump. Although Thomas also skated a strong long program, Witt was ranked first by the majority of the nine judges and thus reclaimed the world title.

Both Witt and Thomas were favored contenders in the 1988 Olympic Games. Their rivalry was known as the "Battle of the Carmens", as each woman had independently elected to skate her long program to music from Bizet's opera Carmen. They held the top two spots after the compulsory figures and the short program. Witt skated her long program well, but not spectacularly, landing four triple jumps and downgrading her planned triple loop jump to a double loop. This left room for Thomas to win the long program, but Thomas skated poorly, missing three of her planned five triple jumps. Canadian skater Elizabeth Manley won the long program, but Witt retained her Olympic title based on her overall scores (she had finished ahead of Manley in both the compulsory figures and the short program). Witt became only the second woman in figure skating history (after Sonja Henie) to defend her Olympic title. To honor her and her win in Calgary DPR Korea issued miniature sheets with three large pictures of Witt on the ice.

In 1988, Witt started a professional career, which was unusual for East German athletes. She spent three years on tour in the United States with Brian Boitano, also a gold medalist in figure skating. Their show "Witt and Boitano Skating" was so successful that for the first time in ten years, New York's Madison Square Garden was sold out for an ice show. Later she continued at Holiday on Ice in the United States and in Western Europe.

Katarina Witt at Geneva world championship (1986)

At the 1988 Calgary Olympics

Following the dissolution of East Germany, Ministerium für Staatssicherheit (Stasi) files showed that the secret police had worked hard to keep Witt from defecting by giving her cars, accommodations, and permitted travel.

She also became an actress in the film Carmen on Ice (1989), which expanded upon her gold medal freestyle routine at Calgary. In 1990, she received an Emmy Award for her role in this film.

In 1994, she made a comeback to the competitive skating scene. She was again coached by Jutta Müller and qualified for the 1994 Winter Olympics in Lillehammer, where she finished 7th. This was Witt's first international competition for the reunified country of Germany, following 11 years competing for East Germany. Much-noted was her free program to the music “Sag mir wo die Blumen sind” (an arrangement of the Pete Seeger folksong "Where Have All the Flowers Gone"), considered remarkable for its artistic impression, including a peace message for the people of Sarajevo (the site of her first Olympic victory). She received the Golden Camera for her Olympic comeback. In the same year she published her autobiography Meine Jahre zwischen Pflicht und Kür (My Years between Compulsories and Freestyle).

In 1995, she was inducted into the World Figure Skating Hall of Fame.

In 1996, she had a cameo role in the movie Jerry Maguire. She also starred in a German-language movie called "Princess on Ice". Witt provided the vocals for the theme song, "Skate With Me".

In December 1998, Witt posed nude for Playboy magazine. The issue in which these photos were published was the second ever sold-out issue of the magazine. (The first sold-out issue was the inaugural one including photos of Marilyn Monroe.) Also in 1998, Witt appeared in the movie Ronin with a small supporting role and several lines of script. Around this time, she also played a villain in an episode of the tongue-in-cheek television series, V.I.P.

Witt has been known for her beauty and sex appeal as well as for her athleticism. Time magazine called her “the most beautiful face of socialism.” At the peak of her career, she was thought by some to resemble Brooke Shields, both of whom were in their late teens / early 20s at the time.

Witt's taste in figure skating costumes sometimes raised eyebrows. At the 1983 European championships she skated her Mozart short program in knee breeches instead of a skirt. Her blue skirtless feather-trimmed 1988 costume for a showgirl-themed short program was considered[who?] too theatrical and sexy, and led to a change in the ISU regulations which required female skaters to wear more modest clothing, including skirts. In 1994, skating a Robin Hood-themed program, she again pushed the boundaries of costume regulations by wearing a short tunic over leggings.

In November 2005, she published a novel, Only with Passion, in which she offers advice to a fictional young skater based on her many years of skating. Since October 2006, she has her own TV show at the German station ProSieben Stars auf Eis (Stars on Ice).

On 7 July 2007, Witt was a compere at the German segment of Live Earth.

Witt was invited to Istanbul as an honoured guest for the skating competition TV show called Buzda Dans (Dance on Ice). The competition took place on February 25, 2007.

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