Christian Reich took up bobsledding in 1986 and, by 1989, was good enough to win silver in the four-man at the World Championships alongside Donat Acklin and the non-Olympians Nico Baracchi and René Mangold. He first attended the Winter Olympics in 1992, where he was 10th in the two-man with Christian Meili, fifth in the four-man alongside Meili, Bruno Gerber, and Gerold Löffler, and he was seventh in the four-man at the 1994 edition with Löffler, Meili, and René Schmidheiny. In 1995 Reich switched to piloting and, by 1997, was competing at the World Championships once again, where he won a silver medal in the four-man. He was disqualified, however, alongside the first- and third-placing Swiss teams, for competing with a bobsled that the national team had been using all season, unaware that it was illegal. At the 1998 Winter Olympics he was fourth in the two-man with Cédric Grand and seventh in the four-man alongside Grand, Steve Anderhub, and Thomas Handschin, before taking silver in the two-man with Urs Aeberhard at the 1999 European Championships.
Reich’s career really took off in 2000, when he was overall World Cup champion in the two-man and runner-up in the combined. He and Aeberhard also captured bronze in the two- and four-man events at the World Championships, with the assistance of non-Olympians Bruno Aeberhard and Domenic Keller in the latter. In 2001 Reich and Anderhub were runners-up in the two-man at the European Championships and, in 2002, won that title. Reich was also runner-up in the combined and third in the two- and four-man in the World Cup standings that season, but his greatest success came at that year’s Winter Olympics, where he and Anderhub won silver in the two-man. They also came in sixth in the four-man alongside Urs Aeberhard and Guido Acklin. Reich retired from active competition shortly thereafter and worked as head coach of the Monégasque national team until 2006. He was also involved in bobsledding at a technical level, running a business that manufactured sleds (including those used by the Swiss team the 2010 Games), and became Vice President of Corporate and Financial Affairs of the International Bobsleigh & Skeleton Federation in 2010.
Switzerland