Mikaela Shiffrin

[Bern]

I can't remember the name of the steep pitch about midway on the woman's Lake Louise downhill course. Standing still at the top of the section....I decided to tuck it.....after a while I came out of my tuck because I was going too fast and if I caught an edge it would have be a painful yard sale fall for me....I was likely only going 1/4 of the speed of the women.

I once worked for a company...they hired Karen Stemmle (Brian's sister) & Liisa Savijarvi....both Olympians .....to conduct a ski camp....I was host to some of our customers....these gals were so talented...at times...... they were able to instruct us skiing backwards while providing the lessons.

They also have very efficient nets, you would sail straight into trees. I think you may be referring to The Curtain.

[Ignatius Reilly]

Just finished watching my PVR’d race. Wow, she is a beast. Second run she was givin’ ‘er hard! And that crowd was sooooo loud! Love it. Wish we could get those kinds of crowds for skiing in Canada. We wouldn’t have lost the Lake Louise Downhill for women. Even the men’s downhill is at risk. Now, the problem there is it is almost 2 hours outside of Calgary and parking sucks for even an average ski day, let alone the added crowds for a downhill.

A bunch of thoughts, to your post and others.

So.... Shiffrin came in 2nd by .06 seconds to miss tying the record this morning. So close, it'll happen soon enough.

In terms of Calgary's proximity, I don't think that's the problem. I had to look up where today's race was - Špindlerův Mlýn is about 2 hours from Prague and Dresden. Who knew? With a population of 1,000 I wonder what the parking and other guest infrastructure is like. Banff/LL sure have issues there that seem to be getting worse.

Alpine skiing really isn't as popular here as in Europe. Because we do hockey? And curling? Dunno.

Whistler has the infrastructure and is close (enough) to a big city and an airport and has hosted a successful Olympics but IIRC there was a lot of last-minute panic about the lack of snow. Didn't they have to move a ton of snow to make it all work? You can make that effort for an Olympics, but a regular WC race?

I've only seen one WH race live (downhill) and it's not a great spectator sport unless you park yourself at the finish line and get the festive atmosphere. Watching from part way down it was 3 minutes of waiting followed by 3 seconds of action as someone went by in a flash and a roar - and you didn't know who it was or how their run was going.... Maybe that would be better now - I assume you might be able to get an app that answered those questions?

I've skied the DHs at LL and was more surprised by how steep they weren't rather than how steep they were for the most part. IMO it's the tucking and lack of turning that make them exciting. Speed turns them up to 11, as it were.

[Mr22putt]

Whistler has the infrastructure and is close (enough) to a big city and an airport and has hosted a successful Olympics but IIRC there was a lot of last-minute panic about the lack of snow. Didn't they have to move a ton of snow to make it all work? You can make that effort for an Olympics, but a regular WC race?

Whistler, generally speaking, never lacks for snow for skiing.
We had an unusual warm spell during Feb 2010 and it was the alpine events held at Cypress Mtn in West Vanc., that struggled for snow and yes, they trucked in snow from Manning Park (at least 2+ hrs away from downtown Vanc.).

[Hype One]

Whistler used to host a men's World Cup DH and SG. It was always the "Winterstart" event and the first races in NA prior to Beaver Creek. The issue was always early season snow conditions, especially after FIS required water injection for hill prep. The races were moved to Lake Louise where early snow was more likely.

There are a number of hills in Canada that are homologated by FIS for WC usage for both men's and ladies events, with speed events being limited to western Canada due to the size of the hills and terrain variations. Mt. St. Anne can host Entry Level FIS DH and SG events. There are a large number of ski areas across Canada that can host technical events as the vertical drop and terrain requirements are different for SL and GS. 2024 sees Mt. Tremblant hosting two ladies WC GS events, an agreement with FIS that will see Canada hosting for a number of years to come.

Interest and sponsorship plays a huge role in alpine in Canada. I grew up in the sport and competed until I was 20 before becoming a coach, working with high-performance athletes.

[duffer_mcmulligan]

A bunch of thoughts, to your post and others.

So.... Shiffrin came in 2nd by .06 seconds to miss tying the record this morning. So close, it'll happen soon enough.

In terms of Calgary's proximity, I don't think that's the problem. I had to look up where today's race was - Špindlerův Mlýn is about 2 hours from Prague and Dresden. Who knew? With a population of 1,000 I wonder what the parking and other guest infrastructure is like. Banff/LL sure have issues there that seem to be getting worse.

Alpine skiing really isn't as popular here as in Europe. Because we do hockey? And curling? Dunno.

Whistler has the infrastructure and is close (enough) to a big city and an airport and has hosted a successful Olympics but IIRC there was a lot of last-minute panic about the lack of snow. Didn't they have to move a ton of snow to make it all work? You can make that effort for an Olympics, but a regular WC race?

I've only seen one WH race live (downhill) and it's not a great spectator sport unless you park yourself at the finish line and get the festive atmosphere. Watching from part way down it was 3 minutes of waiting followed by 3 seconds of action as someone went by in a flash and a roar - and you didn't know who it was or how their run was going.... Maybe that would be better now - I assume you might be able to get an app that answered those questions?

I've skied the DHs at LL and was more surprised by how steep they weren't rather than how steep they were for the most part. IMO it's the tucking and lack of turning that make them exciting. Speed turns them up to 11, as it were.

To your paragraph 2 and line 3, population is a big factor. As well as proximity to alpine areas. I was at a meeting about 8 or 9 years ago discussing the build out plan for Panorama and there was discussion of the proposed Jumbo resort about 40 km up the road from Pano. The point was made that in Europe, when discussing alpine resorts, they could pull from over 750MM people within 3 hours travel time from most resorts. In Alberta, Banff has maybe 2MM people total within that travel time. Jumbo would have had maybe 100k tops. So, if your general population has maybe 2% skiing fans willing to travel a couple hours to see a race, Europe just has the numbers. They also have greater numbers of people who live in alpine environments. So it is more part of the culture. I was chatting with Linda Read (Ken’s wife) while our kids were in the same program and she said in Europe, kids finish school in the afternoon and they are immediately on snow for an hour or two before dark. School kids in those environments skied every day of the winter. The miles on snow they get vs our kids who might do Sat/Sun and here, two nights at Canada Olympic Park running gates doesn’t compare.

Our hockey culture stems from kids in Ontario, Quebec and the prairies skating on frozen rivers and ponds every day after school. It is what we have access to.

I agree ski racing is a tough watch. Downhill and super G more problematic than slalom or GS due to the length of the courses. Hard to get a good venue. Slalom is potentially an awesome spectator sport. Especially evidenced by the recent urban races in Europe and the dual slalom events. Canada Olympic Park, here in Calgary, when the expanded the hill with a new chair, they added enough height at the top of the ridge to allow a FIS slalom course in order to qualify for hosting a World Cup slalom. We used to have a WC moguls comp and aerials comp for 5 years in the early 2010’s. They were pretty cool because you can easily see the whole event from the viewing area at the bottom. We just hosted a major freestyle skiing event, half pipe, slopestyle, big air. Those are a gas to watch.

In terms of the structure of a WC downhill, some of the World Cup runs, like kitzbeuhl, have super steep sections, but the technical difficulty comes from turns on those steep sections with fallaway aspect lines and having to set up at the end of a highly technical section for a flatter, glide focussed section. Downhills typically aren’t run on the most difficult runs for recreational skiers as the demands/techniques are totally different.

To Hype One’s point, Alpine Canada right now is a hot mess. Basically broke. Only a very very few athletes don’t have to self fund, maybe one or two. Most in the development ranks have to post a $50k bond to be able to ski for Canada, and all costs associated with travel, race entry, act, are covered by most of the athletes themselves. they also have to guaranty they will get a certain minimum sponsorships as well. And Alpine Canada takes some of that money out of the athletes pockets. It isn’t the best athletes that make it to the World Cup in Canada, it is those that can afford it. most skilled athletes drop out due to financial pressure, middle income kids need not apply.

[Fredk]

I can't remember the name of the steep pitch about midway on the woman's Lake Louise downhill course. Standing still at the top of the section....I decided to tuck it.....after a while I came out of my tuck because I was going too fast and if I caught an edge it would have be a painful yard sale fall for me....I was likely only going 1/4 of the speed of the women.

If it was the same setup as when I was there that would be the Men's Downhill. The course used to start on Headwall Bowl, merge onto Charlie's Choice, then Wiwaxy, then onto Men's Downhill. It was a turn from Wiwaxy onto Men's Downhill.

That turn off of Wiwaxy was where a lot of skiers crashed. I can't remember the exact speeds, but I think it was around 80 to 90 kmph.

[Fredk]

...

I've only seen one WH race live (downhill) and it's not a great spectator sport unless you park yourself at the finish line and get the festive atmosphere. Watching from part way down it was 3 minutes of waiting followed by 3 seconds of action as someone went by in a flash and a roar - and you didn't know who it was or how their run was going.... Maybe that would be better now - I assume you might be able to get an app that answered those questions?
...

I guess. If you were an enthusiast that liked to go fast(ish) down steep stuff it was fun to watch, particularly at a tricky turn where things could go wrong.

I used to get going pretty good on my 210's and could hold a full tuck from the bottom of Sunset Pocket (bypassed the Mens') to the base. As fast as I got, the downhillers were way faster.

[Chambokl]

If it was the same setup as when I was there that would be the Men's Downhill. The course used to start on Headwall Bowl, merge onto Charlie's Choice, then Wiwaxy, then onto Men's Downhill. It was a turn from Wiwaxy onto Men's Downhill.

That turn off of Wiwaxy was where a lot of skiers crashed. I can't remember the exact speeds, but I think it was around 80 to 90 kmph.

Olympians . . . 75 to 95 MPH (120 to 145 KPH) . . . so yes a lot faster. Crazy

[Fredk]

Olympians . . . 75 to 95 MPH (120 to 145 KPH) . . . so yes a lot faster. Crazy

I don't think they were quite that fast in the late '70s and early '80s when I was in Louise.

FWIW the best alpine event to watch is aerials. From just below the jump, you see all the action and get a real appreciation for just how high they go and how fast they land.

Moguls are pretty good too, but you don't see all the action from up close like the aerials.

[Ignatius Reilly]

Shiffrin has just appointed Karin Harjo - head coach of Canada's women's ski team - as her personal coach for next season.

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/20...n-harjo-skiing

[ARL67]

And let's not forget she just eclipsed Stenmark's record with her 87 victory.

The folks over at my ski forum ( SkiTalk ) were commenting how her epic feat didn't even garner a home-page mention on ESPN's website.

[duffer_mcmulligan]

And let's not forget she just eclipsed Stenmark's record with her 87 victory.

The folks over at my ski forum ( SkiTalk ) were commenting how her epic feat didn't even garner a home-page mention on ESPN's website.

Unfortunately skiing is not on most sports fans radar, especially in the US. She should/will be considered one of the all time athletic greats in her sport, along with Pele, Jordan, Gretzky/Howe/Orr, Hank Aaron, Spitz, etc.

This season she is running at some 85% probability of ending up on the podium of every race she enters. She really is magnificent to watch.

That being said, the Golf Channel broke over to report it during their broadcast of the Players this weekend. That shocked me! In a good way!