Toni Matt

Anton "Toni" Matt (November 21, 1919 – May 17, 1989) was an Austrian-American ski pioneer, champion racer, Guinness Book World Record Holder, and veteran of the U.S. Army's 10th Mountain Division.

Skiers trained by Schneider quickly spread across the United States, developing the growing ski industry in the years following World War II.

Matt's most renowned feat came on April 16, 1939, when in the Third "American Inferno", a top-to-bottom race of Tuckerman Ravine on Mount Washington, New Hampshire, he "schussed" (skied straight downhill without turning) the steep and infamous Headwall.

His time for the 4-mile (6.4 km) race was 6 minutes 29.2 seconds, with an estimated top speed of over 90 miles per hour (140 km/h), cutting the existing course record in half.

A family-loaned collection of Toni Matt's memorabilia – including the 1939 Inferno Cup and other trophies, photos, video, and audio – can be experienced at the New England Ski Museum in Franconia, New Hampshire, located at the base of the Cannon Mountain Tramway, and The Eastern Slope Branch at North Conway New Hampshire on the Town Green near the 1880's Victorian Train Station Three times during the 1930s, a ski race was run from the summit cone of Mount Washington, the highest mountain in the northeastern United States, to the base lodge at Pinkham Notch.

Years later, he said that when he reached the floor of the Headwall, at the transition from steep to relatively flat, he felt lucky to be "nineteen, stupid, and have strong legs".

[7] The next day the Boston Herald described the impression Matt's run made: Maintaining almost unbelievable speed and control down the snow fields of the summit cone, the almost vertical 1000-foot headwall of Tuckerman ravine and the twisting pitches of the Sherburne trail, Matt literally raced the entire field of 44 starters into the snow.

[12] And finally, the John Sherburne Ski Trail was constructed after the second Inferno, providing a faster route from the bottom of the Little Headwall to Pinkham Notch.