Berchtesgaden (pps) As a child he took sled rides to school in winter, as an active luger he took two World Championship titles as well as a silver medal at the 1976 Olympic Games, and for more than two decades he is now exerting a strong influence on the future of the International Luge Federation, FIL. Josef Fendt, President of the International Luge Federation since 1994, will celebrate his 60th birthday at home in Berchtesgaden on October 6, 2007.

Fendt and the FIL were reaping the fruits of his labour last summer: Luge is now one of the seven core sports at Olympic Winter Games. This decision was taken during the 119th Session of the International Olympic Committee, IOC, in Guatemala City. Fendt, already re-elected for the third time, hopes to head the International Luge Federation until 2014. “I enjoy being the captain of the FIL”, Fendt explained during the Jubilee Congress in Innsbruck when the FIL celebrated its 50th anniversary.

„With his equanimity, ill-will and hostility seems to wash over him like water off a duck’s back“, it was written in the „1976 Who’s Who” of the National Olympic Committee for Germany, thus characterizing the Olympic silver medallist in the men’s single. During his second career as an official, Fendt kept this character trait – first as a Vice President Sport (elected on May 5, 1985) and then, since June 25, 1994, as successor to the late FIL founding President Bert Isatitsch of Austria.

Josef Fendt, who is close friends with IOC Vice President Thomas Bach and cultivating an international network of contacts, introduced a higher level of professionalism within the International Luge Federation. Since 1995 Viessmann is supporting the FIL as main and titles sponsors of the Luge World Cup, other sponsors such as Eberspächer and Suzuki followed later. For more than ten years now, the FIL is financing its own TV productions. Under Fendt’s leadership the FIL has been further expanding its Developing Programme for national federations, the Solidarity Programme has been continued and the competition format successfully modernized.

Figurehead of these courageous modifications is undoubtedly the introduction of the team relay competition which will become an integral part of the Competition Programme as of next season. Josef Fendt: “This is the course we need to take. We cannot rest on our laurels but need to constantly develop and being open to new ideas.”

Continuity has always been paramount in his professional career: starting off as a clerk in the administrative social services department the hobby mountaineer worked his way up to manager of the Municipality of Berchtesgaden. The birth of daughter Christina in 1983 sealed the wedded bliss of Josef Fendt and his wife Renate.