Ski icon dies.
Pepi Gramshammer was an Austrian skiing legend and pioneer Vail business owner.
On a perfect bluebird day at the birthplace of alpine skiing in the heart of the Austrian Alps, Pepi Gramshammer skied to a stop so he could share something from his heart with a journalist from Colorado. Despite being a native Austrian and growing up surrounded by the country’s majestic mountains, on that day in 2001, he wanted to talk about the one place he had come to
love above all: Vail Mountain.
Gramshammer was a Vail pioneer, opening one of the town’s first hotels in 1964 when there were only a handful of buildings in the fledgling resort. The former professional ski racer adored the town of Vail until his death on Aug. 17. He was 87.
When he went back to Austria in 2001 to attend the Alpine World Ski Championships in St. Anton, he was recognized all over the mountain because of his success as a racer more than 40 years earlier. His heart belonged to Vail, though, and he wanted the writer from The Denver Post, who’d joined him on the mountain that day, to share that with folks back home in Colorado.
“It’s beautiful skiing, but you know what? I’m glad I’m in Vail,” Gramshammer said in the 2001 interview. “In Vail, you can ski every day; if it snows, it doesn’t matter. And we have the best snow. The grooming and everything else is fantastic. You can’t beat it.”
Gramshammer was one of Vail’s most colorful personalities. His Hotel-Gasthof Gramshammer and Pepi’s Bar and Restaurant, both still in operation, are known for authentic Austrian delicacies and gemeutlichkeit (warmth, friendliness and good cheer in German). Whenever Vail hosted Alpine World Ski Championships, Pepi’s became “Austria House” for Austrian ski racing fans, including Arnold Schwarzenegger. They all loved Pepi and his wife, Sheika, also a native of Austria, whom Pepi met at a ski race in 1963.
“He was instrumental in helping Vail become a world-class ski resort, internationally known,” said John Garnsey, a retired Vail Resorts executive who served on organizing committees for the three Alpine World Ski Championships held at Vail/Beaver Creek. “He was very well-respected in Europe. As I had the opportunity to travel, campaigning for world championships with him around the globe, he made so many critical introductions for us that had a profound impact on our success in creating a credibility for Vail.”
The bar at Pepi’s displays trophies and medals he won as a ski racer. A trail on Vail Mountain, just up the street from his restaurant, is named Pepi’s Face.
“There are few people as synonymous with Vail as Pepi Gramshammer,” Vail Resorts said in an official statement marking his passing. “He was a force for Vail from its inception and an inspiration to all of us. His contributions to the sport of skiing and to the Vail Valley, combined with his incomparable energy and passion for the mountains, will be forever missed and will continue to live on in spirit. Our thoughts and prayers are with Sheika and the entire Gramshammer family.”
Gramshammer grew up in Kufstein near Innsbruck, which hosted the Winter Olympics in 1964 and 1976. He was named to the Austrian national team in 1955 on a squad that included ski greats such as Toni Sailer — who swept the men’s alpine gold medals at the 1956 Olympics — and Anderl Molterer.
After being left off the Austrian team for the 1960 Olympics at Squaw Valley, a shaken Gramshammer turned to the U.S., going to work as a ski instructor at Sun Valley and racing on a domestic tour. In 1962, he was lured to Vail for a visit by Dick Hauserman, Bob Parker and Morrie Shepard, early Vail advocates and investors. It was love at first sight.
“I decided to leave Sun Valley to come here,” Gramshammer said in a 2015 interview with The Denver Post. “It was the most beautiful place. I liked it because there is a lot of snow, we are high-altitude, everything is perfect. You don’t have this in Europe, not like this here. This is really, really, really nice.”
Gramshammer was part of delegations that the Vail Valley Foundation sent to meetings of the International Ski Federation in bidding for the Alpine World Ski Championships, the biggest event in skiing outside of the Winter Olympics. Vail/Beaver Creek hosted successful world championships in 1989, 1999 and 2015. Aspen is the only other American ski resort that has hosted a world skiing championship, and that was back in 1950.
“It is with profound sadness that we share in the loss of Pepi Gramshammer, an icon of the skiing world, a giant in our community, a valued leader, and one of the most charismatic people we have ever known,” the Vail Valley Foundation said in a statement. “Pepi was a visionary. He saw what Vail could become.”
Vail loved him as much as he loved Vail.
He also was fiercely proud of becoming an American citizen.
“The skiing is good, everything is good, people are nice, I love to be here,” Gramshammer said in the 2015 Denver Post interview. “I just love it. Every day, every minute, I love it.”
“As I had the opportunity to travel, campaigning for world championships with him around the globe, he made so many critical introductions for us that had a profound impact on our success in creating a credibility for Vail.” John Garnsey, retired Vail Resorts executive