Lamine Guèye (skier)

Lamine Guèye
Personal information
Born	(1960-07-18) 18 July 1960 Dakar, Senegal
Height	192 cm (6 ft 4 in)[1]

Lamine Guèye (18 July 1960, Dakar) is a Senegalese skier,^[1] and the current president of the Senegalese Ski Federation, which he founded in 1979.^[2]

Guèye represented Senegal at the 1984, 1992 and 1994 Winter Olympics.^[3] He was the first Black African skier to take part in the Olympics,^[4] and has taken part twenty-five times in the Alpine skiing World Cup and five times in the Alpine World Ski Championships. He attempted to compete in the 2002 Winter Olympics, but was unable to do so when the qualification events which he was due to take part in were cancelled.^[5]

Guèye has been a prominent figure in drawing attention to what he considers to be discriminatory qualification rules for the Winter Olympics, and has written to the International Olympic Committee requesting that all countries be granted the right to participate in the Winter Games, as was the case up to 1992 (included), and as is still the case for the Summer Olympics. In 2001, he published the letter he had sent to Jacques Rogge, stating:

"Up until the 1992 Olympic Games, included, every country could send four athletes per event to alpine skiing, and we were able to believe that we were equal. Those were the last true Winter Olympic Games."^[6][7]

Guèye is the author of Skieur sénégalais cherche esprit olympique (ISBN 9782702139356).

He has also had a career as a model and an actor,^[8] and is the grandson of Senegalese politician Lamine Guèye.^[9]

See also

• Tofiri Kibuuka, the first African to compete at the Winter Paralympic Games, eight years before Guèye first competed at the Olympics

References and notes