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Wednesday, 16 January, 2002, 16:06 GMT
Rettl adds colour to Games
The Winter Olympics will certainly be a colourful spectacle.
The pistes, tracks, and rinks will be filled with competitors wearing the latest fashions - some garish, some unashamedly cool.
Then there's Martin Rettl.
Rettl, who is tipped for success in the men's skeleton bob, is an extrovert on and off the track, with a fondness for changing his hair colour.
In the spring of 2000, the Austrian opted to go for the blue look after passing his final air traffic controller exam.
By now, Rettl had caught the bug and had a makeover following every World Cup race last season.
His mother, who dyed his hair, could not treat her son to the salon experience during the last three races in Nagano, Calgary and Park City.
As a result, Rettl decided to dye his hair three colours: red on top, blue on the right and purple on the left.
The Austrian is one of the few skeleton bob athletes who does not train full-time, because he enjoys his job controlling air traffic at Innsbruck Airport in Austria.
But his skeleton record speaks for itself - he won gold at the 2001 World Championships in Calgary with the fastest time on each of the four runs providing a winning margin of 0.88 seconds.
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