Erich Sailer, youth ski coach of Olympians including Lindsey Vonn, dies at 99

Erich Sailer, a Hall of Fame coach who developed young skiers who became Olympians, including Lindsey Vonn, has died at age 99.

His death was confirmed by Buck Hill Ski and Snowboard Area in Minnesota, where he coached from 1969 to 2022.

Sailer (SY-ler), a native Austrian, instructed thousands on a bump of a slalom slope with little more than 300 vertical feet overlooking Interstate 35 just south of Minneapolis.

Sailer taught Vonn's father, Alan Kildow, and then Vonn, who joined the Buck Hill team at age 7, then moved around age 11 to more challenging mountains in Colorado.

"It’s hard to put into words how much of an Impact Erich Sailer had on my life but I will try," Vonn posted. "Erich was more than my ski coach. More than my father’s ski coach. Erich was my family. My father has known him for 62 years and he has been a part of my life since I was born. There is no doubt that I would not be the person or skier I am today without him. The entire ski racing community would not be the same without him. He single handedly did more for skiing than any other coach in America and perhaps the world. Even from the small but mighty Buck Hill, Minnesota-which he put on the map as a premier racing program.

"Today we mourn but also must celebrate Erich. He would want us to be on the mountain, doing what we love to do; ski. I know he’s got his hand timer up there, making sure we are always getting faster and still getting upset with me when I’m leaning too much on my inside ski."

Vonn wrote in "Rise," her 2022 memoir, about Sailer moving to the U.S. in 1955.

"The story goes that when he first arrived, he had thirty-five dollars in his pocket and the only word he knew how to say in English was 'hamburger,'" she wrote.

After running ski camps in Oregon and Montana, he moved to Minnesota and produced a premier developmental ski racing program.

He jokingly called a young Vonn "a turtle." Of her first races, he said, "You could walk faster than she skied," according to The New York Times.

Yet Sailer shook his head when told by others that Vonn should change her technique.

"You’re fast the way you are," Vonn wrote. "That’s the best piece of advice he ever gave me."

She improved under Sailer, following his training routine of skiing 1,000 gates per day on weekends.

“Up and down the mountain, day after day — nights, weekends, holidays — Lindsey was always there, and she never complained,” Sailer said, according to a 2010 Times story. “She would go until we turned off the lights at night.”

Those hours with Sailer laid the foundation for a legendary career: the first U.S. woman to win Olympic downhill gold in 2010, plus four World Cup overall season titles and 82 individual World Cup race victories.

"For the people that live here, they don't need a big mountain," Sailer told NBC’s Twin Cities affiliate earlier this year. "She proved it."

Sailer and Vonn FaceTimed on the eve of her final race before her 2019 retirement.

“Of course you can do it!” he told her that night, Vonn wrote. “It’s nothing! What’s a minute and a half? I’m ninety-three!”

Last fall, Vonn ended a five-year retirement. She is bidding to race at a fifth and final Olympics next February.

"Erich… I will try to make my last turns in ski racing fast for you… I will try to make them mean something more for you," she posted Thursday while at a preseason training camp in New Zealand. "You always believed in me… even now, at 40. Your passion and love for skiing was the same as when I was a kid. I’m so thankful I got to see you this summer. Thankful to hear that belief in me one last time. I will use that when I’m in the starting gate this last season but also for the rest of my life. I will never forget you. Never."

Sailer, inducted into the U.S. Ski and Snowboard Hall of Fame in 2005, was also a youth coach for retired Olympians Kristina Koznick and David Chodounsky and active Olympians Paula Moltzan and Sarah Schleper.

"There are no words. My heart is broken, yet I have never felt more grateful," Koznick posted. "You were my coach. You were my mentor. You poured your heart and soul into me. I was so blessed to know and love you Erich. The ski racing was just frosting on the top. All the wins were filled with joy because you helped me get there. A big piece of me feels missing without you here. I don’t remember my life on earth without you in it. It won’t be the same without you…… but I will see you again someday. I can’t wait. I love you!!!"