Alpine skiing at the 2002 Winter Olympics – Men's downhill

The marquee event of alpine skiing was held on Sunday, February 10, at the Snowbasin ski area, east of Ogden under clear skies.

Designed by 1972 gold medalist Bernhard Russi, the steep "Grizzly Downhill" course was just 1.777 mi in length, and began at a lofty 9288 ft above sea level, with a vertical drop of 2897 ft. The average gradient on the Grizzly Downhill was 30.87% (17.98°), exceeding the classic layouts of Kitzbühel (860 m vertical / 3312 m length = 25.97%, 15.05°) and Wengen (1025 m vertical / 4455 m length = 23.01%, 13.30°).

The top five finishers completed the course in less than a hundred seconds, making it the quickest descending Olympic downhill. The average speed of the medalists for the entire course exceeded 64 mph, rating it among the fastest courses in international competition.

Pre-race favorite Stephan Eberharter of Austria took the bronze medal, bested by compatriot Fritz Strobl and all-arounder Lasse Kjus of Norway. Strobl's average speed was 64.538 mph, at an average vertical descent of 29.224 ft/s.

Results
The race was started at 10:00 local time, (UTC −7). At the starting gate, the skies were clear, the temperature was -3.0 C, and the snow condition was hard; the temperature at the finish was lower, at -4.0 C.