Industry News
Retired German ski racer Felix Neureuther, son of ski racers Rosi Mittermaier and Christian Neureuther, has shared a post on social media in which he criticizes the early FIS alpine race schedule as well as the wide-spread habit for athletes of all ages to train on Europe’s glaciers during the summer.
The FIS Alpine World Cup kicked off last weekend in Sölden, Austria, on the Rettenbach Glacier, which has received criticism from Greenpeace as well as Protect our Winters (‘POW’).
Below is Neureuther’s statement translated from German:
“My summary of the World Cup kick-off:
First of all. Hats off to Sölden for a great race weekend, although unfortunately the men’s race could not be finished.
In the run-up to the kick-off, I was critical of the timing of the World Cup kick-off and the associated construction measures. I absolutely stand by that!
But I not only want to criticise, but also always try to find solutions!
The questions I asked myself are:
- How can the fascination and credibility of skiing be ensured in the future, despite climate change?
- Is it dredging and the associated effort on a mountain that go viral?
- Is the general population interested in skiing at the end of October?
- What efforts must be made in advance by associations, ski companies and Athletes in order to be fit to compete in time?
- How do you create fair conditions for all athletes and associations in terms of preparation and costs?
- Are the children and parents in particular willing to make this effort in the future?
- Can the parents still afford this at all?
- How do we manage to get more children excited about sport?
- What exact effects does climate change have on skiing?
- Is the product still interesting enough for companies to invest?
- How can you significantly reduce the CO2 footprint?
The FIS has the responsibility to get to the bottom of exactly these questions and to act! But the associations and organisers are also challenged!
These questions should have been asked years ago. But it continues as before and the FIS talks about the globalisation of ski racing, which is total nonsense!!!
Due to the World Cup calendar, organisers are driven to take measures that harm skiing. Instead, skiing should be a pioneer in how to implement things correctly and sensibly so that people still want to experience this joy in the future.
2 things would have to be changed that would have a great effect!
First: In mid/end of November, a start of the Ski World Cup is enough.
At the start, you start with giant slalom and slalom for women and men in Sölden! This allows you to kill several birds with one stone.
You create a winter sports start with several disciplines! The interest of the population would be significantly higher, because people are slowly looking forward to winter.
You wouldn’t have to fly to Finland in mid-November to get a World Cup there before max. 1,000 spectators to drive.
The World Cup in Zermatt/Cervinia would then have to take place in the middle/end of March.
This would take an insane amount of pressure, already in the preparation alone, for the athletes, ski companies and associations, because the athletes would have significantly more time to prepare. Especially the speed drivers who
would then start their season in the USA.
The organisers would thus have more time to prepare the slopes and would not be so driven to finish a slope in almost summery temperatures.
Secondly: And this is the biggest change. There will be a ban on pole training of 1. May to 31. August introduced! Similar to the test ban in Formula 1.
The reason why I write this is the following. Meanwhile, 10-year-old children train in mid-July and in August on the glaciers of Zermatt and Saas Fee. The effort as a result is enormous!!! This trend is not good! Children should jump into the lake in summer and do other sports and not ski at 3,500 metres! This early professionalisation of sport drives away an insane number of children! Children up to the age of 14 do not have to ski in summer! In addition, only the very few can afford that!!!
This ban would save not only the parents, but also the associations and ski companies a lot of costs.
The idea of fairness would also be more given, because parents would no longer have to spend tens of thousands of euros already in the summer. In addition, the location advantage of some countries will no longer be so advantageous and other countries would have more chances of being competitive.
After a season, the athletes would have much more time to recover and protect their body.
But the most important reason is that you would save a lot of CO2 because you would greatly limit the effort and travel!
I think you would have a lot of positive reasons that you could carry to the outside world and would not put skiing in such a bad light!!!
The pressure that you train so many rods, especially with children, was taken out.
Finally, one more thing is important to me! With my statements, I don’t want to harm skiing!!! Quite the contrary! I’m still one of the biggest fans of this great sport!!! And people love him because he makes eyes shine! I want to achieve one thing! That the people out there still want to go skiing with a clear conscience! That this sport does not become even more elitist, as it already is! But this urgently needs changes and quickly!”
The statements made by Felix are PROFOUND!
As an Alpine High School Coach in the states I see this ongoing grab for more gate time made by well intentioned and financially privileged parents, for their kids. It occurs and is enabled by many things, but I would say mostly money, with no other considerations. Money for the individual clubs, money for the coaches, money for the local USSS, money for the ski areas, money for the FIS, and all the other economically affected entities.
No thought is given to the negative aspects of this input. Not for the glaciers, not for the atmosphere, not for children and young adults who focus on only one thing in life, more gates for all the wrong reasons.
The FIS should step up and be responsible for this monster they’re creating.
This is not an iron man competition, more is not always better, for many reasons.
I’ll also add that the club racer involved in High School ski racing has ruined it for the average student and school team. The privileged few are taking away from the school team spirit because of this year round involvement in our sport, at what future cost and impact?
Felix is spot on. This is a winter sport. Mining snow from glacier’s to accommodate an earlier season or trying to make up for climate change should not be allowed, I don’t care how much money sponsors lose. If there’s no snow, the event should be cancelled. If the season is too long it should be shortened. Excavating glaciers is only a costly and damaging temporary fix, more respect should be given to the environmental realities
FIS needs to come to their senses and put fair limits on this great sport that are fair for the earth, the athletes and the families involved.
These statements come from an adult who has been a lifelong skier, a ski racer, a parent of ski racers, and now a ski coach.
I totally agree with your comments Felix!!!!
Thank you very much for making these extremely relevant statements!!!!