Hilda Múdra
Slovak figure skating coach (1926–2021)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Hilda Múdra, née Hildegard Klimpel (1 January 1926 – 22 November 2021), was an Austrian-born Slovak figure skating coach. Her most notable student was Ondrej Nepela, the 1972 Olympic champion.
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Múdra in 2012 | |
| Personal information | |
|---|---|
| Other names | Hildegard Klimpel |
| Born | 1 January 1926 |
| Died | 22 November 2021 (aged 95) Bratislava, Slovakia |
Early life
Múdra was born as Hildegard Klimpel to Paul and Anna Klimpel in Vienna. Múdra was coached by Rudolf Kurtzer and Will Petters in Vienna.[1] She trained first in single skating and then ice dancing.[1] In the mid-1940s, she toured with an Austrian ice show which visited Czechoslovakia, and then began coaching in Bratislava.[2][1]
Career
The first of her students to win a medal at the European Championships was Jana Mrázková.[2]
Múdra coached Ondrej Nepela for 15 years, having first met him in February 1958.[3][4] He would win gold at five European Championships, three World Championships, and the 1972 Winter Olympics. In 2000, he was named Slovak athlete of the 20th century — Múdra accepted the award from the Slovak president, Rudolf Schuster, on behalf of her deceased student.[1]
Múdra also worked with Jozef Sabovčík, Sanda Dubravčić, Jana Mrázková, Agnesa Wlachovská, Charlotte Walter, Martin Skotnický, Marián Filc, Eva Grožajová, Miroslav Šoška, Ľudmila Bezáková, Miljan Begović, and Eva Ďurišinová.[3][5][6] In her 80s, she fractured vertebra as a result of a fall, preventing her from returning to the ice, but she continued to coach children from behind the boards in Dúbravka, Bratislava.[7]