Worlds: History being made at Val d'Isere

“Once upon a time, there was a small village…” That’s how World Cup founder Serge Lang began one of his stories published in 1993 in a book dedicated to the 25th Anniversary of World Cup racing at Val d’Isère. The Frenchman, who attended for so many years the now legendary ‘Critérium de la 1ere Neige’ competitions held since 1955 in the French resort, launched a true revolution in 1968 when he decided to start the third World Cup season in December in that lost valley renowned since the 1948 Olympics for its famous champions as Henri Oreiller, the Goitschel sisters and Jean-Claude Killy.“Once upon a time, there was a small village…” That’s how World Cup founder Serge Lang began one of his stories published in 1993 in a book dedicated to the 25th Anniversary of World Cup racing at Val d’Isère. The Frenchman, who attended for so many years the now legendary ‘Critérium de la 1ere Neige’ competitions held since 1955 in the French resort, launched a true revolution in 1968 when he decided to start the third World Cup season in December in that lost valley renowned since the 1948 Olympics for its famous champions as Henri Oreiller, the Goitschel sisters and Jean-Claude Killy.

Since then, the resort set a record of World Cup races organized on the ‘La Daille’ slopes and became one of the top mountain areas in the world for recreational skiers. In 1992 Val d’Isère also organized the thrilling men events of the Albertville Winter Olympics crowning some of the best skiers of that time such as Patrick Oertlieb in downhill, Kjetil Aamodt in Super-G and skiing legend Alberto Tomba in giant slalom.

Today, Val d’Isère is reaching a further prestigious step in entering the very exclusive ‘club’ of resorts having hosted Olympic Games, World Cup events and FIS Alpine World Championships – Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Innsbruck, Chamonix, Sestrière and St Moritz.

“It think all those who worked hard for decades promoting ski racing in Val d’Isère can be very proud, it’s something exceptional for us,” said former Sports Club Director Jean Claude Fritsch who ran for such a long time the organization of the ‘Critérium’. He also strongly contributed to establishing Val d’Isère as a credible candidate for the Worlds in 2002.
 
Val d’Isère is now ready – weather permitting – to host very exciting World Championships on the beautiful ‘Rhone-Alpes’ slopes on Solaise and the ‘La Face’ courses on ‘Bellevarde’.  73 nations register for those 40th FIS Alpine World Championships, including teams from Mongolia and Nepal.

The last World Cup events were pretty dramatic, especially on the women’s tour with four champions dominating the scene – USA’s defending World Cup champion Lindsey Vonn, Sweden’s ‘golden girl’ Anja Paerson, Germany’s slalom star Maria Riesch and Austria’s giant slalom rocket Kathrin Zettel. They should provide thrilling moments to the numerous spectators who are planning to come at Val d’Isère in the coming weeks.

The situation is comparable on the men’s side where nearly ten nations will be fighting for gold in the five disciplines during the coming fortnight. Superstars as Hermann Maier, Bode Miller, Didier Cuche, Aksel Lund Svindal, Jean-Baptiste Grange, Michael Walchhofer, Ted Ligety just to name a few of them are expected to excel for the greatest pleasure of the crowd and the millions of TV spectators in all five continents.

So let’s hope for two great weeks here in Val d’Isère.

Patrick Lang
Chief of Press
Val d’Isère 2009