Cortina d’Ampezzo DH canceled
Snow and the prospect for more led to unsafe conditions on the Olympia delle Tofane course in Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy, canceling Saturday’s downhill.
FIS officials promptly made the decision to reschedule the race for Sunday, opting to go for the downhill in lieu of the previously planned super G. The race has been slated for 11:30 a.m. CET (5:30 ET).
The jury made the decision after a second inspection of the race course with three athlete representatives, including Stacey Cook.
“It was close to being good enough, but it wouldn’t have been a fair race. I think with the Olympics being so close, it was on a lot of minds not to risk something happening so close to the Olympics,” said Cook. “For the whole field and especially the later runners, the snow would not have held up.
The announcement comes a day after the second of two downhill training runs was also canceled due to weather.
“We’ve gotten pretty used to this,” Cook added. “We haven’t had any races canceled until today, but we’ve lost a few training runs. We just have to take it for what it is, be professional and keep the track in our heads. It will be pretty easy to stay focused for tomorrow.”
Next weekend, Cortina is again expected to host speed races, which were moved from Garmisch-Partenkirchen due to a lack of snow in the German resort.