Hellmut Seibt – A life for figure skating
Every year in February, the Eissport-Klub Engelmann (EKE) organizes an international competition for young figure skaters in honour and memory of Hellmut Seibt, a long time EKE club member and a great figure skater.
The following lines paint a portrait of the successful athlete’s career.
Hellmut Seibt was born on the 25th of June 1929 in Vienna. At age 4, Seibt suffered from pneumonia and was thereafter advised to do a lot of out door exercising. That’s when young Hellmut put on skates at the renowned „Engelmann“ in the Viennese district of Hernals for the first time. Soon Rudolf Kutzer discovered his talent, and he and Karl Schäfer supported it. Hence, success was on its way.
Of course, the second world war inhibited Seibt’s rapid development in the sport, yet, shortly after the war, Hellmut Seibt (now competing for the newly formed EKE) proved himself in nationals where he placed 4th in the singles event, and even second in the pairs event (with Susi Giebisch). Working hard on himself with the help of Inge Lind-Solar, and spending some time training in the USA, Hellmut Seibt became nearly unstoppable:
Seibt became a 3-time national champion (1950-1952), 2-time European Champion (1951 and 1952), a bronze medallist in the world championships in 1951, and a silver medallist in the 1952 Winter Olympics.
After the Olympics, Seibt decided to leave amateur figure skating, turned professional, and joined the „Wiener Eisrevue“ (now Holiday on Ice) where he performed for three years.
In March 1956, he married Inge Regner, (how else could it be) a figure skater who is an EKE member as well.
After quitting show life, Hellmut started his highly successful coaching career.
In Vienna, he worked with many successful Austrian figure skaters like Hanna Eigel, Regine Heitzer, Trixi Schuba (1955-1962), Evelyn Rossoukhi-Schneider, Christa Jorda, Sissy Zehetmayer, Günter Anderl, Gerhard Hubmann, Ronald Koppelent, Peter Jonas as well as Claudia and Helmut Kristofics-Binder and the pair Hinko-Döpfl.
From 1962-1967, Seibt worked in Düsseldorf coaching among others Petra Ruhrmann, Dagmar Lurz and Uschi Kessler who is a well known choreographers today.
The World Championships in Dortmund and Köln were successfully organized under his supervision. After leaving Germany, Hellmut Seibt became coach of the Italian national team in Milano (1967-1972) and lead Rita Trapanese from rank 16 to a silver medal at Europeans.
He was Austrian national team coach in Austria as well for a long time until he passed away far too early in 1992.
All the best of luck to the competitors of the Hellmut Seibt Memorial, may he inspire you to perform at your best.
EISSPORT-KLUB ENGELMANN