Sölden! October 28th & 29th

[Primoz]

@Rudi Riet if it will be just today/tomorrow it shouldn't really matter much. But if it's going to be later on, like Thursday, Friday or especially on night to the race, then it will make things more difficult. Not that they wouldn't run the race (unless it's too foggy) but race course would be much softer.

 

[K2 Rat]

More injuries ....



http://olympics.nbcsports.com/2017/10/24/carlo-janka-knee-injury/

 

[Muleski]

I wish we could acknowledge or thank for posting, as I hate to "like" any injury news.

Carlo Janka has had a rough time with illness and injury. Great skier. Was such a phenom.

Best of luck to him.

 

[K2 Rat]

For those with The Olympic Channel, Women's GS is also on at 6:30am EDT on Sat. I guess they are expecting a bumpy track as they list it as "Freestyle Skiing" !!!

 

[Cheizz]

There's a big chance the men's race on Sunday will be cancelled. A small dump of at least one foot of fresh snow (possibly two) is forecast for Sunday during the day.

 

[K2 Rat]

There's a big chance the men's race on Sunday will be cancelled. A small dump of at least one foot of fresh snow (possibly two) is forecast for Sunday during the day.

I don't remember it ever being cancelled for too much snow. If need be, I would hope they just run it Monday or even Tuesday. . Plenty of time to get to Levi !!!

 

[4ster]

I don't remember it ever being cancelled for too much snow. If need be, I would hope they just run it Monday or even Tuesday. . Plenty of time to get to Levi !!!

@Primoz will know better but they typically will not do the Monday, Tuesday postponement thing because of TV coverage, sponsors etc. However, they will often add a makeup race to a different venue later in the season if time permits.

 

[K2 Rat]

@Primoz will know better but they typically will not do the Monday, Tuesday postponement thing because of TV coverage, sponsors etc. However, they will often add a makeup race to a different venue later in the season if time permits.

I understand and I don't recall races ever being postponed and then run a day later at the same venue (outside or Worlds/Olympics) for the reasons you list and also that, typically, the tour needs to move on to the next stop. I know it is still difficult, but here at least there is no next stop and I would hope they can figure a way of pulling it off a day later. I also can't imagine housing would be an issue next Monday in Soelden. Before they had a roof at the US Open tennis and it rained on Finals Sunday, they would extend the tourney a day. I understand that this is not a fair comparison : Soelden WC vs US Open tennis !! But is has to be so frustrating and costly for venues, teams, etc to do all the preparation/travel for an event to lose it to mother nature. Let's hope Soelden goes off without a problem.

 

[Primoz]

I don't think there's chance at all to postpone race to next day. It's so much logistics behind, that it's simply impossible. They do everything to run the race in first place (I have been on the hill for 6+ hours already when they were postponing and postponing just to be able to run shortened version of downhill some 5h later then originally planned), but if it doesn't go, they cancel it and try to find new place during season to run this canceled race. Running it day or two late is pretty hard thing to do. After Soelden most of teams go home for few days and then forward to training camps. Some of them drive, some of them fly, so tickets are booked, hotels are reserved for specific days only (Soelden is so early that half of hotels in Soelden open just for this weekend and then close again for another month when season really starts). Another thing is TV coverage. It's pretty much impossible to fit 2h race into schedule for next day when schedules are made long before, and without live TV coverage on all key channels across the world, it's pretty much useless to even run the race. And then there are spectators on site. Huge majority booked hotels till Sunday, and on Monday most of them are at work, so majority will leave Soelden on Sunday afternoon/evening, and if race would be there on Monday/Tuesday, they would run it infront of 1000 people, which would be disaster for Austria races
But 30-50cm snow, especially if it's during the day, won't make them cancel the race. In last few years it has been normal they got 30-50cm snow overnight, so we came up to hill with track still fully covered with new snow, and by the time of start, course was cleaned and ready to be run. Sure conditions were everything but great, but race went through. Downhill is different thing, but for GS, I don't see heavy snow dump as threat at all. In my mind, only problem they might cancel race is fog. Everything else is manageable.
@K2 Rat I think we can't really compare US open with ski race. One ski race doesn't really bring much overall. I mean sure it can decide who will win overall WCH, but it's still just one race, that can hopefully be run some other time through season. With US Open, you can't finish it without final match. So at least in my mind, there's no option to declare both finalists as winner of tennis tournament if conditions for finals are not good enough for finals to be played. So if Sunday is not an option, they need to postpone match to first appropriate day after Sunday. Not to mention TV stations will fit tennis match into schedule a bit easier then ski racing, which is, if we like it or not, marginal sport.

 

[K2 Rat]

I understand that is is nearly impossible to makeup a race on the Monday and maybe it is just wishful thinking on my part. Yes, one can't compare US Open tennis to a ski race. The only pro tennis tournament I can remember that was not finished due to rain was 1987 Volvo International at Stratton, VT where Lendl and McEnroe never played their final ( my father was a linesman there). But you can't compare Volvo International to US Open either. It is just frustrating to see races that really mean something get cancelled. In 2011 with Vonn leading the overall after the final DH, the SG and GS got cancelled and Riesch won the overall by 3 points based on her WC Finals slalom. And then in 2013 after a season ending crash on Feb 5, Vonn led the DH standings by one point going into the WC Finals and the DH gets cancelled. I don't have any numbers, but my guess is that the WC fan base is declining. These tight standing contests are exciting and maybe the tour would gain some fans if they figured a way out to run these type of races.
Maybe I am crazy and don't know enough about staging an event ( i actually know nothing !), but lets take Kitzbuel as an example. The Hahnenkamm DH is the grand daddy of them all and so important, in my opinion, to maintain and grow WC fan base. If the FIS built into the schedule that Sunday would be a make-up DH day and Monday would be make-up SL day, could everyone make plans around this? The tech guys could race on Monday and still get to Schladming for the Night SL and the speed guys only have to go down the road to Garmisch. I know, SL guys would not want to race back-to -back. I was in The Londoner bar in Kitzbuhel after the Sunday SL in 2002 and Bode walked in at midnight. Didn't seem like he was in any hurry to go anywhere! But then again, he was in his RV that year. Maybe they just have to suck it up and race slalom 2 days in a row and stay out of the bar!
Looking at Kitzbuhel though, only once in the last 30 years was the DH cancelled on race day due to weather. They typically can pull off some sort of shortened course and had to about half of the last 20 years, with a few times running only 50-60% of the course. It is a whole lot easier to just run a shortened course and it saves the TV coverage and the crowd on a Saturday and all the logistics nightmare as @Primoz pointed out. OK, I just want my cake and it too and see the DH from the top, but it is probably better to just go with a shortened course on race day. Although Rahlves only won it from 60% of the course, he is a Hahnenkamm champion and I would never tell him otherwise! But outright cancelling WC finals races is another story. I wish that could change somehow.
As far as Soelden, the least they could do if it ever gets snowed out is have the racers compete in a Powder 8 contest !! Somebody was practicing that yesterday...

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[ZionPow]

I understand that is is nearly impossible to makeup a race on the Monday and maybe it is just wishful thinking on my part. Yes, one can't compare US Open tennis to a ski race. The only pro tennis tournament I can remember that was not finished due to rain was 1987 Volvo International at Stratton, VT where Lendl and McEnroe never played their final ( my father was a linesman there). But you can't compare Volvo International to US Open either. It is just frustrating to see races that really mean something get cancelled. In 2011 with Vonn leading the overall after the final DH, the SG and GS got cancelled and Riesch won the overall by 3 points based on her WC Finals slalom. And then in 2013 after a season ending crash on Feb 5, Vonn led the DH standings by one point going into the WC Finals and the DH gets cancelled. I don't have any numbers, but my guess is that the WC fan base is declining. These tight standing contests are exciting and maybe the tour would gain some fans if they figured a way out to run these type of races.
Maybe I am crazy and don't know enough about staging an event ( i actually know nothing !), but lets take Kitzbuel as an example. The Hahnenkamm DH is the grand daddy of them all and so important, in my opinion, to maintain and grow WC fan base. If the FIS built into the schedule that Sunday would be a make-up DH day and Monday would be make-up SL day, could everyone make plans around this? The tech guys could race on Monday and still get to Schladming for the Night SL and the speed guys only have to go down the road to Garmisch. I know, SL guys would not want to race back-to -back. I was in The Londoner bar in Kitzbuhel after the Sunday SL in 2002 and Bode walked in at midnight. Didn't seem like he was in any hurry to go anywhere! But then again, he was in his RV that year. Maybe they just have to suck it up and race slalom 2 days in a row and stay out of the bar!
Looking at Kitzbuhel though, only once in the last 30 years was the DH cancelled on race day due to weather. They typically can pull off some sort of shortened course and had to about half of the last 20 years, with a few times running only 50-60% of the course. It is a whole lot easier to just run a shortened course and it saves the TV coverage and the crowd on a Saturday and all the logistics nightmare as @Primoz pointed out. OK, I just want my cake and it too and see the DH from the top, but it is probably better to just go with a shortened course on race day. Although Rahlves only won it from 60% of the course, he is a Hahnenkamm champion and I would never tell him otherwise! But outright cancelling WC finals races is another story. I wish that could change somehow.
As far as Soelden, the least they could do if it ever gets snowed out is have the racers compete in a Powder 8 contest !! Somebody was practicing that yesterday...

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Great photo! My favorite memory of working at the 2015 Worlds at Vail/Beaver Creek was the day we got about a foot of snow overnight. I was asked to ski (not slip) the entire Women's downhill course to "knock the air out of the snow". The race was postponed that day.

In 2001 we attempted to run a men's WC race on the 2002 Olympic downhill at Snowbasin. After 2 great training days, we got 3 straight days of 12 - 18" of snow. We never had an official race. One day after the race was cancelled, Herman Maier (The Herminator) asked me to show him where to ski a powder run. I will never forget watching him ski the POW in the Jungle on John Paul!

 

[K2 Rat]

Federica Brignone will not race this weekend. She won there in '15 and won the last WC GS in Aspen last march. She is saying that she is not 100% fit and ready. I don't recall, but i think she had some kind of physical problem this summer.

 

[4ster]

In 2001 we attempted to run a men's WC race on the 2002 Olympic downhill at Snowbasin. After 2 great training days, we got 3 straight days of 12 - 18" of snow. We never had an official race. One day after the race was cancelled, Herman Maier (The Herminator) asked me to show him where to ski a powder run. I will never forget watching him ski the POW in the Jungle on John Paul!

Haha, I remember that day! I was supposed to be "working" for NBC that week. My job was going to be holding a mic as they racers pushed out of the start on Ephraims Face. NBC had a large trailer set up down in what is now Maples Lot as base of operations. I would ski down every morning from the old lodge to a buffet breakfast & wait to see if they needed anything. I recall that the racers got at least one training run in but it was snowing a lot that week. One morning we watched a highlight reel, not of the racers but of the course workers losing their grip on the ice & sliding uncontrollably with increasing speed till the B net caught them. The film crew thought this was great!

On the day of the race, I remember Todd Brooker finally coming in to say that the race had been cancelled. I asked if there was anything I could do but they said no as usual. I was pretty excited that I was going to be paid to ski powder again but just as I was reaching for the door the guy in charge said "Hang on a minute". I thought sure my powder plans were gonna be smashed until he continued "You might want to check back around noon because we have a special chef coming in from L.A. to prepare a gourmet lunch!" Even though the skiing was spectacular, I couldn't miss a free lunch.

Another Herminator story from that day was that while the rest of the Austrian team where ordered to the gym Herman was allowed or demanded to go ski (with @ZionPow apparently). Anyway, once he was done with JP laps he headed over to Strawberry with one of the Instructors. Still in his DH skis he hit the first big bump on Main Street, threw a huge 360 Helicopter, landed it & proceeded to shred the pow without skipping a beat. Needless to say, everyone was duly impressed.

 

[Muleski]

Federica Brignone will not race this weekend. She won there in '15 and won the last WC GS in Aspen last march. She is saying that she is not 100% fit and ready. I don't recall, but i think she had some kind of physical problem this summer.

Yep. Hip Abductor. Strain/minor tear, I think.

Field is "kind of shrinking....."

 

[Started at 53]

There are a ton of logistics behind a TV production/broadcast that you can’t begin to comprehend unless you are part of it. Nearly impossible to postpone a day or two. Heck, an overrun is a nightmare for the guys behind the scenes.

 

[ZionPow]

One morning we watched a highlight reel, not of the racers but of the course workers losing their grip on the ice & sliding uncontrollably with increasing speed till the B net caught them. The film crew thought this was great!

I actually did a slide for life on Off Track canyon into the B net one day. Apparently a water injection gun hose broke during the night and flooded an area on the track. It was covered with snow and I found it the hard way! Fortunately I did not get hurt and it was not caught on camera. I did have to buy a round for the crew that evening

 

[4ster]

I actually did a slide for life on Off Track canyon into the B net one day. Apparently a water injection gun hose broke during the night and flooded an area on the track. It was covered with snow and I found it the hard way! Fortunately I did not get hurt and it was not caught on camera. I did have to buy a round for the crew that evening

From what I saw there must have been a lot of beer bought!!! Bode almost did the slide for life in Off Track Canyon too during the Olympic combined DH!

The film crew seemed to enjoy doing ski races (Mostly they did football) & found it to be a challenging yet rewarding experience.

 

[K2 Rat]

someone posted on FB that the men's race, as we already know, is at risk due to weather : high winds up to 120km and precipitation they said starting on Sat night. But also said that it will not be rescheduled later in the year since it is the WC Opening.

I looked up the rule :

18.1 Cancellation during an event and new allocation Races, which have to be cancelled during an event due to a "force majeure", or non-fulfilment of requirements will in exceptional cases be rescheduled at events which already figure in the calendar. World Cup Opening: Races, which have to be cancelled during the Opening, will not be rescheduled. World Cup Finals: the schedule of events during the World Cup Finals cannot be changed. Races, which have to be cancelled during the World Cup Finals, will not be rescheduled.

Obviously, it makes sense that a WC Final race will not be rescheduled, but I don't know why a WC Opening race can't be added to another event during the rest of the season ??

Wow , this could really end up benefiting Marcel ......

 

[K2 Rat]

Vonn just announced that she will be racing on Sat.....if the conditions are safe.

I understand that based on her more than 500 WCSL points (with no WCSL GS points), she will get inserted at bib #31

 

[Moses]

CANNOT wait to see Vonn race on Saturday