At the age of three, Nancy Greene's family moved to Rossland, British Columbia, a mountainous area and the site of the first ski competition ever held in Canada in 1897. The child of avid skiers, Greene began at a young age and while in high school she competed in the Canadian Junior Championships. She would go on to become Canada's most decorated ski racer in history with the most World Cup victories, male or female.
Nicknamed "Tiger" because of her go for it attitude and her aggressive style of skiing, she won the Canadian ski championship six times and the United States championship, three times. In 1967, Nancy Greene broke the European domination of the sport, becoming the first North American skier to win the World Cup. That year she won seven of 16 events, taking the over-all title with four giant slalom victories, plus two in slalom and one in downhill. Her accomplishment earned her Canadian "Athlete of the Year" honors.
In 1968 she won the World Cup title again plus at the Winter Olympic Games in Grenoble, France, she captured a gold medal in the giant slalom by one of largest margins in Olympic History and a silver medal in the slalom. For the second time, she was named Canada's "Athlete of the Year."
Following her retirement from competition, she served as Canadian national ski team coach until 1973 and made a major contribution to Canadian sport by accepting an appointment to the federal Government's "Task Force on Sport For Canadians." Married with twin boys, Nancy Greene and her husband Al Raine were instrumental in the early development of the Whistler-Blackcomb Resort in Whistler, British Columbia. Dedicated to the promotion of her sport, for more than 30 years the Nancy Greene Ski League has been an important entry-level race program for young children.
Over the years, Nancy Greene has been the recipient of numerous awards including her country's highest civilian honor, the Order of Canada. She has been honored with the naming of "Nancy Greene Provincial Park" and "Nancy Greene Lake" in the Monashee Mountains of British Columbia's Kootenay region. In 1999 her name was engraved in Canada's Walk of Fame and she was voted Canada's female athlete of the century in a survey of newspaper editors and broadcasters conducted by The Canadian Press and Broadcast News.
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