Skiing: Undeniably a Girl

Most champion women skiers cut a fairly sturdy figure in stretch pants. It is a shame, of course. But a girl who grows up in the Alps is likely to start skiing as soon as she can walk, and by the time she is ready for the Olympics, she bulges with muscles. Europeans have learned to live with such disappointments; they have even learned to expect them. So imagine their surprise last week when Europe's best got trounced by a slim-ankled snow bunny from Oregon who is undeniably a girl.

Mistaken Impression. Daughter of a U.S. forest ranger, Jean Saubert, 21, learned to ski from her father, who took her to Sun Valley, Idaho, for two weeks' vacation once a year. The family settled in Cascadia, Ore., just 40 miles from Hoodoo Ski Bowl, and by the time she was 14, Jean was good enough to win the slalom at the National Junior Championship in Reno. But it is a long way from the junior championships to the Olympics, and nobody paid much attention when she finished sixth in the giant slalom at the 1962 Fédération Internationale de Ski championships in Chamonix, France. When she returned this winter as a member of the U.S. Olympic team, many European fans actually were under the impression—from her name—that she was a man. "So-bare?" they said, giving it the French treatment. "Who eez he?"

"He" turned out to be the best woman slalomer in the world. In the "Criterium of the First Snow" at Val d'Isère, France, last month, Jean Saubert (rhymes with "Aw, Bert!") won the giant slalom and swept the women's combined Alpine championship. At Oberstaufen, Germany, two weeks ago, she split two slalom races, winning one and placing third in the second. Last week at Grindelwald, Switzerland, all of Europe's top skiers were on hand for the winter's biggest pre-Olympic competition. When lack of snow forced cancellation of the downhill race and threatened to wipe out the whole program, the Swiss moved the races to the base of the Eiger, a forbidding 13,036-ft. peak in the Bernese Alps that has claimed the lives of a score of mountain climbers.

"Awful Fast." The courses were icy and treacherous—the worst many skiers had ever seen. On her first run in the special slalom, Jean caught an edge and finished 5 sec. behind France's Marielle Goitschel. "I'll have to go awful fast on the second run," she said—and onlookers gasped as she zipped through the 52 gates in the fastest time of the day, only to be disqualified for missing a gate. That was just a tune-up. Next day, in the giant slalom—a combination slalom and downhill that demands sheer straightaway speed as well as maneuverability—Jean snowed everybody under. Purists noted that her skis were too far apart and not quite parallel as she swooshed through the gates. But they could hardly fault the results: paying no attention to the ice, pumping furiously to get more speed, flipping through the gates so closely that she grazed the poles, Jean flashed down the 1,200-yd. course in 1 min. 37 sec., nearly 2 sec. faster than Runner-Up Traudl Hecher of Austria. Nobody else came within 4 sec. of her time.