# Alpine skiing at the 2006 Winter Olympics – Men's downhill

The men's downhill of the 2006 Winter Olympics was held at Sestriere, Italy, on Sunday, 12 February.
The men's downhill competition is the marquee outdoor event of the Winter Olympics, and is the first alpine event on the schedule. It consists of a single high-speed run down a challenging slope, with a vertical drop exceeding 800 meters (2,625 ft).
The defending Olympic champion was Fritz Strobl of Austria, the reigning world champion was Bode Miller of the United States; Austrian Michael Walchhofer was the defending World Cup downhill champion and led the current season entering the Olympics, ahead of Strobl and American Daron Rahlves.
The thirtieth racer on the course, Antoine Dénériaz of France won the gold medal, Walchhofer took the silver, and the bronze medalist was Bruno Kernen of Switzerland; Miller was fifth, Strobl eighth, and Rahlves tenth. Dénériaz's surprise win was by a margin of 0.72 seconds, the largest in this event in 42 years. He had entered the Olympics tied for tenth in the World Cup downhill standings; his best finish was seventh at Val Gardena in mid-December.
Held on the Kandahar Banchetta piste, the course started at an elevation of 2,800 m (9,186 ft) above sea level with a vertical drop of 914 m (2,999 ft) and a length of 3.299 km (2.05 mi). Dénériaz's winning time of 108.80 seconds yielded an average course speed of 109.158 km/h (67.8 mph), with an average vertical descent speed of 8.401 m/s (27.6 ft/s).

## Results

The race was started at 12:00 local time, (UTC +1). At the starting gate, the skies were partly cloudy, the temperature was −5.6 °C (22 °F), and the snow condition was hard; the temperature at the finish was 2.1 °C (36 °F).
| Rank | Bib | Name | Country | Time | Difference |
| | 30 | Antoine Dénériaz | France | 1:48.80 | — |
| | 10 | Michael Walchhofer | Austria | 1:49.52 | +0.72 |
| | 14 | Bruno Kernen | Switzerland | 1:49.82 | +1.02 |
| 4 | 17 | Kjetil André Aamodt | Norway | 1:49.88 | +1.08 |
| 5 | 18 | Bode Miller | United States | 1:49.93 | +1.13 |
| 6 | 15 | Hermann Maier | Austria | 1:50.00 | +1.20 |
| 7 | 28 | Marco Büchel | Liechtenstein | 1:50.04 | +1.24 |
| 8 | 4 | Fritz Strobl | Austria | 1:50.12 | +1.32 |
| 9 | 25 | Patrick Staudacher | Italy | 1:50.29 | +1.49 |
| 10 | 20 | Daron Rahlves | United States | 1:50.33 | +1.53 |
| 11 | 22 | Pierre-Emmanuel Dalcin | France | 1:50.35 | +1.55 |
| 12 | 3 | Tobias Grünenfelder | Switzerland | 1:50.44 | +1.64 |
| 13 | 29 | Manuel Osborne-Paradis | Canada | 1:50.45 | +1.65 |
| 14 | 8 | Lasse Kjus | Norway | 1:50.64 | +1.84 |
| 15 | 23 | Scott Macartney | United States | 1:50.68 | +1.88 |
| 16 | 11 | François Bourque | Canada | 1:50.70 | +1.90 |
| 17 | 13 | Ambrosi Hoffmann | Switzerland | 1:50.72 | +1.92 |
| 18 | 6 | Kurt Sulzenbacher | Italy | 1:50.84 | +2.04 |
| 19 | 27 | Steve Nyman | United States | 1:50.88 | +2.08 |
| 19 | 19 | Peter Fill | Italy | 1:50.88 | +2.08 |
| 21 | 26 | Aksel Lund Svindal | Norway | 1:50.90 | +2.10 |
| 22 | 21 | Klaus Kröll | Austria | 1:50.91 | +2.11 |
| 23 | 12 | Kristian Ghedina | Italy | 1:50.98 | +2.18 |
| 24 | 16 | Yannick Bertrand | France | 1:51.37 | +2.57 |
| 25 | 2 | Finlay Mickel | Great Britain | 1:51.48 | +2.68 |
| 26 | 24 | Didier Défago | Switzerland | 1:51.51 | +2.71 |
| 27 | 7 | John Kucera | Canada | 1:51.55 | +2.75 |
| 28 | 32 | Andrej Jerman | Slovenia | 1:51.70 | +2.90 |
| 29 | 9 | Bjarne Solbakken | Norway | 1:51.72 | +2.92 |
| 30 | 38 | Pavel Chestakov | Russia | 1:51.93 | +3.13 |
| 31 | 34 | Andrej Šporn | Slovenia | 1:52.17 | +3.37 |
| 32 | 1 | Craig Branch | Australia | 1:52.55 | +3.75 |
| 33 | 31 | Patrik Järbyn | Sweden | 1:52.87 | +4.07 |
| 34 | 39 | Petr Záhrobský | Czech Republic | 1:52.90 | +4.10 |
| 35 | 35 | Claudio Sprecher | Liechtenstein | 1:53.34 | +4.54 |
| 36 | 36 | Bořek Zakouřil | Czech Republic | 1:54.07 | +5.27 |
| 37 | 33 | Roger Cruickshank | Great Britain | 1:54.65 | +5.85 |
| 38 | 42 | Aleksandr Khoroshilov | Russia | 1:54.70 | +5.90 |
| 39 | 37 | Alex Antor | Andorra | 1:55.01 | +6.21 |
| 40 | 41 | Konstantin Sats | Russia | 1:55.03 | +6.23 |
| 41 | 47 | Mikael Gayme | Chile | 1:55.73 | +6.93 |
| 42 | 40 | Maui Gayme | Chile | 1:56.10 | +7.30 |
| 43 | 45 | Nikolai Hentsch | Brazil | 1:56.58 | +7.78 |
| 44 | 49 | Michał Kałwa | Poland | 1:56.81 | +8.01 |
| 45 | 54 | Jaroslav Babušiak | Slovakia | 1:57.45 | +8.65 |
| 46 | 43 | Renārs Doršs | Latvia | 1:57.54 | +8.74 |
| 47 | 51 | Nikolay Skriabin | Ukraine | 1:57.56 | +8.76 |
| 48 | 46 | Sindri Már Pálsson | Iceland | 1:57.69 | +8.89 |
| 49 | 50 | Jorge Mandrú | Chile | 1:58.77 | +9.97 |
| 50 | 48 | Roger Vidosa | Andorra | 1:59.24 | +10.44 |
| 51 | 52 | Andrei Drygin | Tajikistan | 1:59.41 | +10.61 |
| 52 | 53 | Alexander Heath | South Africa | 1:59.79 | +10.99 |
| 53 | 44 | Florentin Nicolae | Romania | 2:00.93 | +12.13 |
| | 5 | Ondřej Bank | Czech Republic | DNF | |
| | 55 | Ivan Heimschild | Slovakia | DNF | |