Luc Alphand  is a former french alpine skier and race car driver. Alphand made his World Cup skiing debut in 1984 at the age of 19. In 1997 he managed to win the World Cup by collecting points only in the two-speed disciplines – downhill and Super-G – a unique achievement in World Cup history. In 1996 he won a bronze medal at the Alpine World Ski Championship. Along his ski career he managed 10 wins in downhill world cup events and other 2 in Super-G, and he won the overall Downhill World Cup from 1995 till 1997 and the Super-G in 1997. In futures posts on Wintersports he will explain the characteristics of these two ski events.

He retired from competitive skiing in 1997 and started a career in auto racing. After a long career at GT and Tourism cars track races, he won the 2006 Dakar Rally, in which he had finished runner-up a year earlier. With this victory, he was the first ex-skier to win the Paris-Dakar. After this, he participated in the Le Mans series races between 2001 and 2009, managing to finish 3rd in the 24 hours GT1 category race in 2006.

Luc Alphand suffered severe back injuries in an accident on the Rand’Auvergne all-terrain motorcycle race on 27 June 2009 and in November 2010 he retired from competitive auto racing due to health reasons.