Friend & Ambassador

Germany’s Ralf Schumacher competed in Formula One for 11 years, successively driving for the Jordan, Williams and Toyota teams and winning six Grand Prix during his career.
 
The brother of seven-time Formula One World Champion Michael Schumacher, Ralf started racing at the age of three on his parents’ karting track in Kerpen.  He moved up to the German Formula Three championship in 1995, finishing second and also winning the Macau street race.  The following year he won the Japanese Formula Nippon Championship, an achievement which earned him a place in the Jordan Formula One team in 1997.

With Jordan, Ralf took a place on the podium in just his third race in Argentina, eventually finishing 11th in the championship. He improved on that in 1998 with two more podium finishes and a 10th place in the championship.

Regarded as one of the brightest young drivers in the paddock, at the age of 23 he switched to the Williams team in 1999, where he enjoyed five successful years.
In 2001 he had arguably his best year, winning three Grand Prix, at Imola, Montreal and Hockenheim, and finishing fourth in the world championship.

 In 2002, Ferrari's domination was almost total and they won 15 of the 17 Grand Prix, however Ralf did manage to secure one of the two non-Ferrari victories, at the Malaysian Grand Prix, and once again finished fourth in the championship. The following year he won the European Grand Prix at Nürburgring and the French Grand Prix within seven days.

Ralf’s 2004 season was badly affected by an accident at the United States Grand Prix which resulted in concussion and and minor fractures of his spine. He was in bed for several months causing him to miss six races.

He left Williams at the end of 2004 and spent the last three years of his Formula One career with Japanese team Toyota. His final Formula One race was the Brazilian Grand Prix in October 2007.  In total in his career he took part in 182 Grand Prix and finished on the podium 27 times.

Since retiring from Formula One, Ralf has been a driver in Europe’s DTM Touring Car Championship and in 2010 he drove an AMG Mercedes C-Class car which carried the Laureus logo.

Welcoming Ralf Schumacher as a Laureus Ambassador, Edwin Moses, Chairman of the Laureus World Sports Academy, said: “Ralf is a very passionate competitor and someone who cares very much about giving something back to society. He has already been giving Laureus visibility on the race track over the past year and we are delighted to welcome him as a member of the Laureus Family.”

Ranking:

• National:1st
• South American: 1st
• Ibero American: 1st
• Pan American: 3rd
• World: 24th 

Height: 1.74 mts

Weight: 60 Kg

Sport Played: Pole Vault – Athletics

She started in the sport when she was 12, representing her school. Then she started training formally in the National Centre of High Performance (now known as “Cenard”, and then called “Cedena”). For a while, she trained as a sprinter but she was often injured, so she decided to switch to a coach who prepared field events.

Her first important competition at national level was in 1989 at the National Youth Championships, where she finished second at both the 100m Hurdles and the Pentathlon. The following year, she participated in the South American Junior Championships in different events: 100m hurdles, High Jump, and the Heptathlon. She won her first international medals. 

After maternity, in 1991 she made her come back to athletics. In 1995 she took part in the Pan American Games, and scored her personal best of 5139 points, but later that year, at the South American Championships, the Pole Vault was contested, and she won the event with a modest mark of 3.10m. She was a natural at this sport, since she had only competed once before in 1994.

In 1996, she focused on High Jump and improved her personal best, but she wasn’t chosen to go to the Atlanta Olympic Games. It was then when she started dedicating herself entirely to Pole Vaulting.

In 1999, she won the Pan- American gold medal in Winnipeg. Pan-Am gold

Since then, García has competed in all the main events, and her CV includes the 1999 IAAF World Championships (11th in 4.25), and the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games (tied for 18th in the qualification with 4.15). By then, García had already improved her South American and national record some 28 times, to leave it at 4.42m.

In 2002, García won the Ibero-American Championships for the second time, and in 2003, after retaining the South American crown (she won it in 1995, 99, 01 and 03), García focused on the Pan-American Games. But she pulled a muscle before the final.
In 2004, she set a new South American record of 4.43.

She has dedicated almost all her life to Athletics winning Pan-Am and continental titles but reaching the final of the Olympic Games in Athens has so far been the highlight of her career. For Argentina her Olympic feat was an historic event, followed live on television by millions of viewers around the country, since the last woman to be in a final was Isabel Avellán in the Discus Throw in Melbourne 1956. That’s the last time the country placed someone in the top-8 at the Olympic level. She finished in 13th place. But Alejandra marked a historical moment for athletics in Argentina.

Personal Bests in Athletics
100m: 12.28 ‘00
200m: 25.82 ‘95
100mh: 13.84 ‘96
High Jump: 1.87 ‘96
Pole Vault: 4.43 ‘04
Long Jump: 6.19 ‘95
Triple Jump: 12.53 ‘95
Heptathlon: 5139 ‘95
Sporting Career and Awards
2004
 Wins National Championship – Argentina
 Sets argentine and southamerican record  4.43
 Second Place in the Iberoamerican Championship – Spain
 Finalist in the Olympic Games, finished 13th  - Athens
 Premio Olimpia de Plata, award for best athletics sportsperson of the year in Argentina
 Premio Consagración Clarín, award as one of the best sportsperson of the year in Argentina
    
2003
 Wins Nacional Championship – Argentina
 Wins South American Championship
 Finalist in the Panamerican Games – Dominican Republic
 12th in the World Championship in Paris - France
 Set South American record of 4.31 mts.

2002
 Wins National Championship – Argentina
 Wins Iberoamerican Championship
        
2001
 Wins National Championship – Argentina
 Wins South American Championship
 Finalist in the World Championship in Edmonton – Canada
 Sets South American record

2000
 Winner of National Championship – Argentina
 Wins the Iberoamerican Championship
 Wins Grand Prix Title – Sydney
 Breaks argentine and south american record
 Participates in the Olympic Games – Sydney

1999
 Winner of Argentine Championship - Argentina
 Wins South American Championship
 Sets argentine, south american and iberoamerican record
 Wins the Pan American Tournament
 Finishes 11th in the World Championship – Spain
 Premio Olimpia de Plata, award for best athletics sportsperson of the year in Argentina
 Premio Consagración Clarín, award as one of the best sportsperson of the year in Argentina

1998
 Winner of the Argentine Championship - Argentina
 Wins the ODESUR Games
 Second Place in the Iberoamerican Tournament

1997
 Wins Argentine Championship - Argentina
 Second place in South American Championship

1996: Wins Argentine Championship  - Argentina

1995: Wins Argentine and South American Championships

Ariella Kaeslin is a leading Swiss artistic gymnast.
 
She started gymnastics when she was three and won her first Swiss title six years later.
 
Kaeslin won all five gold medals at the 2007 Swiss National Championships and represented Switzerland at the 2008 Olympics, earning her the accolade of ‘Swiss Sportswoman of the Year’.
 
She became European Champion on the Vault in 2009 and won a silver medal on the Vault at the 2009 World Championships.

Alejandra Garcia Flood is a leading pole vaulter and one of Argentina’s most successful female athletes.
 
She started athletics at the age of 12, representing her school and then joined the National Centre of High Performance, where she was a promising sprinter.
 
At the National Youth Championships in 1989, she finished second in both the 100m Hurdles and the Pentathlon, winning her first international medals at the South American Junior Championships the following year.
 
In 1995 she competed in the Pan American Games, and scored her personal best of 5139 points and at the South American Championships, she won the pole vault with a mark of 3.10m.
 
Despite focusing on the high jump in 1996, she was left out of the Argentina team for the Atlanta Olympic Games and then decided to focus on pole vaulting.
 
In 1999, she won the Pan- American gold medal in Winnipeg and has since competed in the IAAF World Championships and Olympic Games in Sydney and then Athens, where she reached the final, the first Argentine woman to reach the final since Isabel Avellán in 1956.
 

Alessandro Troncon is one of Italy’s greatest ever rugby union players.
 
He started his sporting career at Benetton Treviso’s youth club and became a first team regular at scrum half.
 
He later played with A.S. Montferrand in France and then Auvergne before returning to Treviso, with whom he won the national championship in the 2005/06 season.
 
He first appeared for the Italian national team in 1994 against Spain and has now appeared more than any other player for the side, who he captained on many occasions.
 
In 2006/07 he won the European Challenge Cup with Clermont Auvergne and at the end of the season he appeared in the 2007 World Cup, winning his 100th cap against Portugal. He retired from professional rugby after the Italian team was knocked out of the competition by Scotland.
 

Antonio Rossi is an Olympic gold medal-winning sprint canoer from Italy.
 
Rossi was 10 when he first started canoeing but he made an inauspicious start, coming last in every competition he took part in.
 
Competing in five Summer Olympics, he won five medals which included three golds (K-1 500 m: 1996, K-2 1000 m: 1996, 2000), one silver (K-2 1000 m: 2004), and one bronze (K-2 500 m: 1992).
 
Rossi has also been successful at the ICF Canoe Sprint World Championships with seven medals. This includes three golds (K-2 1000 m: 1995, 1997, 1998), three silvers (K-2 1000 m: 1993, 1994; K-4 200 m: 1998), and one bronze (K-1 500 m: 1997).
 
He was the Italian flag bearer at the opening ceremony of the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing.
 

Umberto Pelizzari is considered to be among the best freedivers of all time.
 
He began freediving at 19 and in 1990 he broke the world record in the Constant Weight discipline with -65 m (-213 feet), achieving his first record in the Variable Weight discipline with -95 m (-311 feet) the following year. He followed that up by setting a new world record of -118 m (387 feet) in the No Limits discipline.
 
Throughout the 1990s Pelizzari became famous for his rivalry with leading freediver, Cuban Francisco "Pipin" Ferreras, who had been his training companion in the early days. Pelizzari extended his records by reaching -80 m (262 feet) in Constant Weight and 150 m (492 feet) in No Limits.
 
In 1996 and 2001, Pelizzari became AIDA World Champion with the Italian national team and he now teaches the Underwater and Hyperbaric Medicine Master’s programme at the Scuola Normale Superiore Sant’Anna in Pisa.
 

Born in Ireland, John Robbie attended school in Dublin and was captain of the rugby teams at both Trinity College Dublin and Christ’s College, Cambridge, where he studied.
 
He represented Ireland and the British Lions in rugby union and was a reserve for South Africa while he was playing for Transvaal.
 
In 1981, he made the permanent move to South Africa and seven years later he won the multi-discipline SuperStars TV Challenge and was named SA Radio Sports Broadcaster of the Year.
 
He is currently the afternoon Drive show host on South Africa’s most highly-respected talk station, 702. With a reputation for speaking his mind, John’s outspoken attitude has helped to spread the word about the great work the Laureus Sports Foundation undertakes.

Frankie Fredericks is the only athlete from Namibia ever to win an Olympic medal.
 
He won a silver medal at the 200m at the 1991 World Championships, the first major championships since Namibia had gained independence from South Africa.
 
The following year, at the Barcelona 1992 Summer Olympics, Fredericks became Namibia's first Olympic medallist when he finished second in both the 100m and 200m and a year later, in Stuttgart, he became the nation's first World Champion, winning the 200m.
 
He earned silver medals in the 100m and 200m at the 1996 Summer Olympics and won the 200m at the Commonwealth Games in Manchester in 2002.
 
As injuries took their toll, Frankie retired from competition in 2004 and he is now a member of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) as well as being a Goodwill Ambassador for Namibia.
 
Frankie has been a Laureus Friend and Ambassador since 2005 and has supported a number of Laureus initiatives.

Fabrizio Macchi had his left leg amputated when he was 16 due to a tumour and yet has gone on to become one of Italy’s finest cyclists.
 
Four years after his operation, he broke the hour record with a distance of 38.53 km, only 10 less than that of able-bodied cyclists. He won a Silver Medal in the time trials at the 2002 World Championships, Gold in the time trials at the 2006 Panamerican Games and Bronze at the 2004 Athens Paralympics.
 
But Fabrizio is an all round sportsman, has achieved honours in many other sports such as ski slalom, rowing, javelin, long jump and track in addition to his prolific cycling career.