The World Cup According to Grande: Equipment Changes and Random Notes

EQUIPMENT CHANGES

Ligety signs with Head, too. As does Chelsea Marshall and it sounds as though Megan McJames might end up there as well?  And what about Julia signing with Voelkl?  And there will be more to come. Marco Sullivan will end up on something new for him and so will others lower down the chain.

The Ligety signing is an interesting one to me. I am a little surprised he did not stay with Rossignol. He was there for a long time and the skis were working for him. There might be a critic or two of the slalom program at Rossi when it comes to Ted but we might want to look at rule changes with regard to course setting and stand-height  and the over-reaction of setters going tighter than necessary as it relates to Ted’s slalom problems. Look at Grange who is on Rossi and Lizeroux who skied on a Dynastar version of the Rossi slalom ski. They did fine, even thrived on the Rossignol slalom. All skiers are different and adapt at different rates to their equipment changes and rule changes. And the men’s team will need to deal with this all summer long and into the fall. Ted will be on Head skis and will have a new service man. His service guy for the last 4 years, Ales Kalamar, will be with Cristoph Innerhofer (ITA) who is a Rossignol downhiller from the Innichen area in Italy. Ales will be missed by Ted and the whole US Ski Team. During my time there, he was a great part of the team and always helpful for everyone, not just Ted. He helped procure skis for Weibrecht and would take on other Rossi skiers whenever necessary. He was also never afraid to jump in and help with training course maintenance or take part in conditioning sessions.

And beyond all of that, Ted will be finding his place in the huge Head pecking order that will need to be developed. Obviously, being the number 1 GS skier in the world, he will have his say in which model, flex, etc. he will use. But he will have to spend quite a few days on snow in New Zealand to get that done. It often can take many sessions to sort through all the models once you get on winter snow and injection when down-under.  Obviously, something has to give in that scenario. Technical work is usually the first to lose in that kind of program. You end up doing a lot of shorter courses with timing, constantly switching skis and/or boots. That also takes time each run and eats into planned volume. And Ted will have a good slalom quiver to choose from as Head is definitely dedicated to developing a slalom program that is among the best in the world. But when I look at their men’s program right now, it looks like a lot of GS skiers who ski speed very well too. All of their new guys fall into that category. One of the athletes is going to have to step up and drive the slalom R&D for Head; maybe that can be Ted? Regardless, with his rankings, it looks like a good move for Ted as he will be high on their list at Head. But he will also ski on the boot, which introduces another variable into the testing program this summer. It will make it harder to decide which ski is best and whether the results are being skewed by the boot as well. And all of that has to happen before they start to try to dial in the set up on the chosen models. And signing all these World Cup hot shots definitely causes a negative on the trickle down of quality equipment. Not with the USA domestic program at all because we will always be one season behind the World Cup, but with the tail-end guys on the World Cup and with Europa Cup in all the disciplines. The best guys will pull the best pairs from the program for themselves in order. So Ted will keep all the best from his quiver for GS, then Cuche, then Aksel, etc. It takes a very long time for good stuff to get down to Marcus Larsson or someone with a similar resume. They had better have excellent quality control and deep pockets to make a lot of great skis from the best materials for a lot of people.

Marco is also moving on to a new and yet undetermined product line. He has been fighting a bad back since the Olympics so has been unable to really test anything effectively.  Personally, as one of Marco’s former coaches, I would love to see him on Rossignol. Mostly because I think the stuff is good and he can share service and product with Weibrecht who came on very strong last season. As well, sometimes you just feel like you can match a skier with a product line in your mind and it just makes sense. It just makes sense to me when I think of his strengths and weaknesses as well as his style. Plus, I think the Rossignol boot would be good for him.

On the girls’ side, they are busy testing away in Mammoth, California right now. Decisions should be made soon on Megan McJames and Kiley Staples. Megan is an interesting study on this testing cycle. She is a technically very proficient GS skier and is coming on in slalom. Her Super G is also pretty good. So where she ends up might drive which events she ends up being stronger in. What could it mean to her future to be on Head? Or Voelkl? Or Atomic? Or Fischer? As well, Julia switched to Voelkl. Voelkl had some money free up on the women’s side after Poutiainen switched to Fischer. So Julia becomes a highly ranked Voelkl athlete in all of her disciplines. She will get a good opportunity at picking skis early in the summer. And Voelkl has a very long history of being very strong on the women’s World Cup. With truly only Niki Hosp on the product, Voelkl should be able to provide Julia with a lot of service support and a nice testing quiver. It does put a lot of pressure on her and the USST staff to get good testing done with her speed stuff on winter snow. All reports from the Mammoth testing camp was that she was very happy with the tech skis and feels confident she has a lot of quality skis to choose from.

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Greg “Grande” Needell grew up ski racing at Stratton Mountain,
Vermont. After graduating from SMS he skied for NCAA Division 1 St.
Lawrence University in Canton, NY where he was co-captain in 1986. Greg
returned to SMS to coach there for five years serving as the Head
Women’s Coach as well as the Head J2 Men’s Coach. He then moved to
Mission Ridge in Wenatchee, Washington in 1992 to become the Program
Director and Head Coach of the Mission Ridge Ski Club. In 1997, Greg
became the Head Coach at Mammoth Mountain, California.

In 2002 Needell was asked to join the U.S. Ski Team staff as a World
Cup SL and GS coach. From 2002 to 2008 Needell helped lead the U.S. Ski
Team Men to 43 wins, 105 podiums and 264 top ten finishes. Now at the
helm of Alpine Race Consulting, Needell offers his knowledge and
experience to clubs nationwide.

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