On This Date in Sports February 2, 1956
In collaboration with the Sportsecyclopedia.com
Tenley Albright becomes the first woman from the United States to win a Gold Medal at the Winter Olympics. Albright wins gold in figure skating at the games in Cortina d’Ampezzo. Her Gold Medal winning performance comes just two weeks after suffering a serious injury during a fall which severed a vein in her right ankle. Fellow American Carol Heiss would take home the Silver, while Ingrid Wendl of Austria got the Bronze Medal.
Born in New Center, Massachusetts on July 18, 1935, Tenley Albright was a gifted skater who used skating as a major part of her recovery from polio, which she contracted at the age of 11. She became a highly decorated skater through college, winning several international competitions. In 1952, Albright got the Silver Medal at the Oslo games, finishing behind Jeanette Altwegg of Great Britain.
After winning the World Championships in 1953 and 1955, Tenley Albright was considered a favorite heading into the games in Cortina d’Ampezzo. However, while training in Italy Albright fell into a rut in the ice and cut her right ankle down to the bone, just two weeks before the games were to begin. Her father, a surgeon flew to Italy and repaired a vein in her leg allowing her to compete.
The figure skating competition at the Cortina d’Ampezzo games was held outdoors, it would be the final time that the skating competition was held outside in the history of the winter games. On January 30th the first day of the two-day competition was held in a heavy snowstorm, with Tenley Albright leading on 9-of-11 judges’ scorecards just ahead of Carol Heiss. Albright and her American teammate remained 1-2 after the final day, as she finished 1.6 ahead of Heiss to capture the Gold Medal, with Ingrid Wendl of Austria taking the Bronze Medal.
Tenley Albright would retire following the 1956 Winter Olympics and followed in her father’s footsteps and became a surgeon. Carol Heiss, the runner-up in Italy, captured her own Olympic Gold Medal at the 1960 games in Squaw Valley.