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Uwe-jens MeyUwe-Jens Mey (born 13 december 1963 in Warsaw, Poland) was a German speedskater considered to be the fastest sprinter of his time because of his 500 metres-supremacy in the late 1980s, begin 1990s.
right His first notable achievement was in december 1983. At the age of 19 he outpaced Andr Hoffmann in the 500 metres and by doing so Mey earned the East-German title and a ticket to the 1984 Winter Olympics in Sarajewo. At the Olympics Mey finished 8th at his favourite 500 metres-distance. In the years after the Sarajewo Olympics he stood firm in the international sprinting sub-top, making step-by-step progression. At the World Sprint Championships he ranked himself respectively 6th, 5th and 4th in 1985, 1986 and 1987. Finishing second behind Dan Jansen in overall standing of the first distances World Cup in 1986 Mey found himself at the 500 metres world top.
Uwe-Jens Mey was a real perfectionist, training hard to improve his technique. He was mid 80s considered to be the fastest starter in the world.
One week before the start of the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary he finished 2nd in the World Sprint Championship, behind a supreme Dan Jansen. Therefore Jansen was the biggest favourite for both the 500 and 1000 m. But because of a family-tragedy (his leukemia-suffering sister passed away just hours before the start of the 500m), Dan Jansen turned out to be mentally incapable of sprinting a perfekt race. In both distances Jansen fell. But if he would have been able to beat Mey that day is doubtable. Uwe-Jens raced perfectly, faster than anyone had ever speedskated before. He started the first 100 m in 9,76 and set the 500m world record at 36,45. A legendary record that stood firm for four years.
Four days after his legendary 500m-race Uwe-Jens Mey started as an outsider for winning the 1000m as well. In not his favourite distance, Mey skated again fast: 1.13,11 was a personal record which he never equalled in his later career. With this time he outpaced the favourite Igor Zhelezovski by 8 hundreds of a second, but Mey found himself in the second place, just behind another outsider, the allround world champion Nikolay Gulyayev. One month later Mey achieved his first 500 metres overall World Cup.By repeating this achievement in the 3 years after that he proved his 500 metres-supremacy. He also won the overall World Cup in his less favoured distance, the 1000 metres, in 1989 and 1990.
At the World Sprint Championships he was less succesfull. In 1989 in Heerenveen he finished second behind a Igor Zhelezovski, in 1990 he did not rank himself because of a fall, and in 1991 he ended once again second behind Igor the Terrible.
In january 1992 he broke at Davos his own legendary world record, setting it at 36,43, but one week later it was broken again by Dan Jansen. With that the 2 favourites of the 1992 Winter Olympics were set. In Albertville Jansen did not get his revenge for Calgary: Mey outpaced him, and all the other sprinters in the field once again, therefore regaining his olympic gold medal. This turned out to be his last official race. Uwe-Jens Mey retired from top speedskating with an impressive palmares: 2 olympic gold medals, 1 olympic silver medal, 4 silver World Championship Sprint medals, 48 world cup victories, 6 overall world cup wins and 2 times world record holder; he truely was the king of 500 metres of his time.
After his skating career Mey became a salesman. References *Deutsche Eisschnellauf Gemeinschaft
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