Snowfall hampers opening Val d’Isere training run

By Published On: December 18th, 2014Comments Off on Snowfall hampers opening Val d’Isere training run
Light snowfall continues in Val d'Isere Thursday morning. SR/Feehan

Light snowfall continues in Val d’Isere Thursday morning. Feehan

VAL D’ISERE, France – Despite warm weather and a lack of snow that forced the relocation of the men’s World Cup technical races from the Bellevarde slope to Are, Sweden, one week later the Val d’Isere organizing committee wrestles with too much of the white stuff. The opening women’s downhill training run scheduled for this morning was canceled after the centimeters continued to pile up overnight.

“Today, you saw that the course is in quite good shape. I was also very impressed,” FIS Race Director Atle Skaardal informed coaches at Wednesday evening’s team captains meeting. “Unfortunately, now the snow is coming when we will not need it for a couple of days, but it’s here. It gives us at least a nice winter landscape around and the possibility for some nice pictures.”

In anticipation of significant additional snowfall overnight, Skaardal announced that the slope would remain untouched until the morning and that some delays to the schedule were possible.

“Due to the fact that the course is … a little fragile, it’s not as rock hard as we could wish for, we decided that we will not go in with the machines and people during the night … because it’s a big chance of destroying what’s already there. That would be a huge mistake, so we will start the work with the new snow tomorrow morning,” Skaardal said last night.

The overnight snowfall wound up on the higher end of the forecast, 20 centimeters in total, and an early call was made during jury inspection to cancel today’s training.

“With this amount of snow, we need between six and eight hours of work to get the slope ready,” explained Skaardal. “We will now focus everything on a great training run tomorrow. According to the forecast, the weather should play along.”

The race crew will work diligently throughout the day to prepare the slope in time for Friday’s lone training run down the Oreiller-Killy (OK) course in advance of Saturday’s downhill and Sunday’s super G races.

The autumn and early winter in the Tarentaise Valley was reportedly the warmest in 100 years, but the race organizers are committed to hosting a successful event nevertheless.

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About the Author: C.J. Feehan

Christine J. Feehan is a USSA Level 300 coach who spent more than a decade training athletes at U.S. ski academies - Burke, Sugar Bowl, and Killington - before serving as Editor in Chief at Ski Racing Media through 2017. She worked for the FIS on the World Cup tour for three years and then settled into her current home in Oslo, Norway.