Jimmy Heuga

When I was a youngster I took a trip from Wisconsin to Colorado with my dad. We got to ski Vail a few days, went to a Broncos playoff game and had dinner with Olympic legend and Buff Jimmy Heuga.

My dad's boss was a pretty big skiier and evidently a friend of Jimmy's so we had the chance to have dinner with him. It's one of those one-time meetings that has stuck with me all these years later.

Most people know or have heard of Billy the Kidd. How could you not. But Jimmy was was an American alpine ski racer who became one of the first two members of the U.S. men's team to win an Olympic medal in his sport. After multiple sclerosis prematurely ended his athletic career, he became an advocate of exercise and activity to combat the disease.

Heuga was born in Tahoe City, California on September 22, 1943. He grew up in Squaw Valley, California, where his father Pascal, a Basque immigrant from southern France, operated the resort's cable car. Jimmie Heuga was on skis at age two and began to compete in the sport at age 5; he appeared in a Warren Miller ski film at age 9. Heuga was named to the U.S. Ski Team in 1958, becoming the youngest man ever to make the squad as a 15-year-old.^[1]

He attended the University of Colorado, where he was coached by Bob Beattie for the first time. A three-time letterman, Heuga won the 1963 NCAA championship in the slalom. With Beattie also leading the U.S. Ski Team, Heuga, along with fellow Buffaloes Billy Kidd, Buddy Werner, and Bill Marolt, formed the squad's nucleus for the 1964 Winter Olympics. Both Kidd and Heuga became the first American men to win Olympic medals in Alpine skiing, respectively capturing silver and bronze in the slalom.^[1]

Heuga died on February 8, 2010, at Boulder Community Hospital in Boulder, due to complications that stemmed from multiple sclerosis.^[2]

• finished sixth in the slalom and fourth in the combined at the 1966 World Championships at Portillo, Chile
• joined the pro racing tour following the 1968 Winter Olympics where he was 7th in the slalom and 10th in the giant slalom.
• was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 1970, which derailed his ski racing career at age 27.
  • early symptoms were first noticed in 1967
• founder of Can Do Multiple Sclerosis, formerly The Heuga Center for Multiple Sclerosis.
• the first NASTAR National Pacesetter (1968)

Jimmy passed away on February 8, 2010.