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Katarina Witt is a  Germany|German figure
skating|figure skater.
Witt won two Winter Olympics|Olympic Gold Medals
for East Germany, first in the 1984 Sarajevo
Olympics and the second in 1988 at the Calgary
Olympics.  She won the world championships in
1984, 1985, 1987, and 1988.  She also won six
European championships.  Her competitive record
makes her one of the most successful figure
skaters of all time.

Witt was born on December 3, 1965 in Staaken
(today part of Berlin, Germany/German Democratic
Republic|GDR).  She went to school in
Karl-Marx-Stadt, today reverted to its
pre-Communist name Chemnitz.  There she attended a
special school for sports-talented children, named
Kinder- und Jugendsportschule.  She represented
the club SC Karl-Marx-Stadt for the GDR (East
Germany). Her coach was Jutta MĂĽller (figure
skater)|Jutta MĂĽller since 1970.

In 1984 Katarina Witt was voted as “The GDR
female athlete of the year” by the readers of
the East-German newspaper Junge Welt.

In 1987 she recaptured the World Championship
title, which she lost in the previous year to Debi
Thomas.  Many people consider her performance at
this event to be the finest of her career.

In 1988 Witt started a professional career, which
was very unusual for East German athletes.  At
first she spent three years on tour in the United
States with Brian Boitano, also a Gold Medal
winner at the Winter Olympics in figure skating.
Their show "Witt and Boitano Skating" was so
successful that for the first time in ten years
New York's Madison Square Garden was sold out for
an ice show. Later she continued at Holiday on Ice
in the USA and in Western Europe.

She also became an actress in the film Carmen on
Ice (1989), which expanded upon her Gold Medal
freestyle routine at Calgary. In 1990, she
received an Emmy Award for her role in this film.

In 1994 she had a comeback to the competitive
skating scene. She was again coached by Jutta
MĂĽller (figure skater)|Jutta MĂĽller and
qualified for the Winter Olympics in Lillehammer,
where she came in 7th place. Especially her free
program to the music “Sag mir wo die Blumen
stehen” was remarkable for the artistic
impression including a peace message for the
people of Sarajavo, the place of her first Olympic
victory. She received the Golden Camera for her
Olympic comeback. In the same year she published
her autobiography Meine Jahre zwischen Pflicht und
KĂĽr (My Years between Compulsaries and
Freestyle).

In 1995 she was admitted to the World Figure
Skating Hall of Fame.



In 1998 Katarina Witt posed nude for Playboy
Magazine|Playboy Magazine. The issue in which
these photos were published was the second sold
out issue of this magazine. The first sold out
issue included photos of Marilyn Monroe. Many were
surprised by the extent of the nudity shown in the
Witt pictorial. Not only did she show her breasts
and buttocks, but also allowed pictures of her
pubic hair to be shown. Also in 1998, Witt
appeared in the movie Ronin (movie)|Ronin with a
small supporting role and several lines of script.

In 1999 she was voted as "Most favourite Female
Athlete in the United States". In the same year
she was also voted as the "Most favourite Female
Skater of the Century".

Witt has been known for her beauty and sex appeal
as well as for her athleticism.  Time magazine
called her “the most beautiful face of
socialism”.  At the peak of her career, she was
thought by some to resemble Brooke Shields, both
of whom were in their late teens / early 20s at
the time.

Witt's taste in figure skating costumes sometimes
raised eyebrows.  At the 1983 European
championships she skated her Mozart short program
in knee breeches instead of a skirt.  Her blue
skirtless feather-trimmed 1988 costume for a
showgirl-themed short program was considered too
theatrical and sexy, and led to a change in the
ISU regulations which required female skaters to
wear more modest clothing with skirts.  In 1994,
skating a Robin Hood-themed program, she again
pushed the boundaries of the costume regulations
by wearing not a skirt but a short tunic over
leggings.

== External links ==
* http://www.katarina-witt.de/ Official Web Site
* * imdb name|id=0001861|name=Katarina Witt
*
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/siwomen/2001/dece
mber/playbook/ Sports Illustrated Dec 2001
Interview

== Results ==

=== Olympic Games ===
* 1984 – 1. Place
* 1988 – 1. Place
* 1994 – 7. Place

=== World Championships ===
* 1980 – 10. Place
* 1981 – 5. Place
* 1982 – 2. Place
* 1983 – 4. Place
* 1984 – 1. Place
* 1985 – 1. Place
* 1986 – 2. Place
* 1987 – 1. Place
* 1988 – 1. Place

=== European Championships ===
* 1979 – 14. Place
* 1980 – 13. Place
* 1981 – 5. Place
* 1982 – 2. Place
* 1983 – 1. Place
* 1984 – 1. Place
* 1985 – 1. Place
* 1986 – 1. Place
* 1987 – 1. Place
* 1988 – 1. Place
* 1994 – 8. Place

=== GDR-Championships (Nationals) ===
* 1979 – 3. Place
* 1980 – 2. Place
* 1981 – 1. Place
* 1982 – 1. Place
* 1983 – 1. Place
* 1984 – 1. Place
* 1985 – 1. Place
* 1986 – 1. Place
* 1987 – 1. Place
* 1988 – 1. Place

=== German National Championships (after the
reunification) ===
* 1994 – 2. Place

== See also: ==
* Figure Skating
* World Figure Skating Championships