Decisions from the FIS Autumn Meeting

By Published On: November 21st, 2014Comments Off on Decisions from the FIS Autumn Meeting
Ladies prize giving ceremony at Soelden 2014. GEPA

Ladies prize giving ceremony at Soelden 2014. GEPA

The FIS Council held its Autumn Meeting at the FIS Headquarters in Oberhofen, Switzerland, on Nov. 18 to deal with a full agenda, including reports from Organizing Committees for the FIS World Championships and Olympic Winter Games, the appointment of technical officials, and proposals from the FIS Technical Committees.

The main decisions of the Council in Oberhofen that are relevant to alpine skiing include the following:

FIS World Cup calendars 2014-15 to 2018-19
Minor modifications to the FIS World Cup calendars for the 2014-15 season proposed by the respective Technical Committees were approved, the final versions of which are available on the FIS website. Of these changes, the most notable is a change of venue for the Audi FIS Alpine World Cup from Bormio, Italy, to Santa Catarina, Italy, on Dec. 28.

The draft calendars for future seasons up to 2018-19 were also acknowledged by the Council.

FIS World Championships and Junior World Championships
Reports on the preparations for the FIS World Championships were received, in particular the final inspections for the 2015 FIS World Championships in Vail-Beaver Creek, U.S.A.

The number of participants in the second run of the technical events at the FIS Alpine World Ski Championships 2015 in Vail-Beaver Creek will remain at 60. A proposal to reduce the number of participants to 30 can only be dealt with by the FIS Congress in 2016.

Dates for the newly-elected FIS World Championships in 2019 were confirmed: Alpine Skiing, Åre (SWE) Feb. 5-17.

Olympic Winter Games
The progress report from PyeongChang in regard to the preparations for the 2018 Olympic Winter Games provided a positive update about the status of the construction of the venues to be ready for the test events in 2016 and 2017.

World Cup 2015-16
The minimum values of prize money for the 2015-16 World Cup season were defined and include increases for Alpine to CHF. 120,000.

Technical Committees
A number of adaptions to the technical rules were made, details of which have been published under the discipline committee reports. Additionally:

Alpine Skiing
The use of “Air Bag Systems” which conform to the FIS rules and specifications will be permitted in World Cup downhill training runs only up until Dec. 31, 2014 and thereafter in all levels of FIS competitions including World Cup.

The starting order system for downhill and super G will be studied until spring 2015.

Hearing Panel Decision – the Thailand FIS Races organised in Krvavec (SLO)
At its Meeting in Oberhofen on 18th November 2014, the FIS Council acknowledged the decision of the FIS Hearing Panel on Nov. 6, 2014 and thereafter decided in application of Article 8.4 of the FIS Betting and Other Anti-Corruption Rules to cancel the results of all four giant slalom competitions that took place Jan. 17-19, 2014 at the Krvavec Ski Area in Slovenia.

As a consequence of its decision to cancel the Krvavec giant slalom races, the FIS Council took note that Vanessa Vanakorn (THA) who competed in the Sochi 2014 Olympic Winter Games therefore did not qualify and should not have been participating in the Sochi 2014 Games.

In the cases of other athletes who obtained the necessary level of FIS points to qualify for Sochi 2014 at the Krvavec giant slalom races (Federica Selva and Ieva Januskeviciute), the Council is of the opinion that they were victims of the manipulated races.

The Council therefore decided to submit its decision and information in regards to the qualification and eligibility of the above mentioned athletes to compete in the Sochi 2014 Olympic Winter Games to the International Olympic Committee (IOC), in order that the IOC may take any further action in its competence.

Release courtesy of FIS

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