Zeke Steggall
1971 -
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Discipline: Snowboard A two-time Olympian, Zeke Steggall was the first Australian to compete in snowboarding at the Olympic Winter Games, making his debut at Nagano 1998. Steggall started competing in the professional circuit under the banner of the International Snowboard Federation, racing in alpine snowboard events. He achieved his first major success in Bormio, Italy, where he won a slalom in 1992, the first of close to 30 podiums in alpine snowboarding. In the lead-up to the Nagano Games, Steggall started competing in FIS World Cup events to gain the necessary points to qualify for the Olympics. He was eventually selected on the Australian Olympic team as the sole snowboarding athlete and participated in the 1998 Winter Games alongside his younger sister Zali, who would eventually win an historic first medal for Australia in alpine skiing. By then Steggall had already started competing in snowboard cross, a discipline that would progressively become his favorite. Unfortunately, snowboard cross never became an Olympic discipline during his career, so Steggall kept competing in alpine. He achieved a second Olympic selection in 2002, where he finished 26th in the Parallel Giant Slalom at Salt Lake City. Over the course of a career marred by foot and ankle injuries, Steggall won 8 FIS World Cup medals in snowboard cross, four of which were gold. He also won Australia’s first Snowboard World Championships medal, a bronze in the Snowboard Cross in 1999 in Berchtesgaden. Less than two months later he won Australia’s first Snowboard World Cup Medal, a Gold in Kreischberg. He also held the Australian National title for 9 years. Zeke’s name appears on a plaque on the Manly Pathway of Olympians and Paralympians alongside his sister’s and those of other Manly residents (past and present) who represented Australia at the highest level of the sport. His son Joey, born in 2003, is an alpine skier who competed at the 2020 Youth Winter Olympic Games. |
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