Men’s Alpine World Cup 2023/24

[Tricia]

I thought I posted this a few days ago but must have dropped the ball.
Kilde is healing well but this is a long road with that severed leg.

 

[James]

Shoulder looks rough too. At least he’s walking pretty well now.
The mental aspect of returning to racing at that level is huge. I don’t see how they do it, but some certainly have, like Hermann Maier, Brian Stemmle.

 

[Noodler]

This was the one I saw the other day (and is more impressive/optimistic for his return):

Aleksander Aamodt Kilde on Instagram: ""

38K likes, 546 comments - akildeMarch 12, 2024 on : ""

www.instagram.com

 

[Primoz]

I know we all love skiing (one way or the other), but let's be real... there's so much money in whole skiing all together, then Horner spends nowadays, when Verstappen and Marko doesn't join him, for his lunch on Thursday before show starts. So comparing what F1 is doing and what skiing is doing is a bit off. Another thing is, skiing run is 50-120sec. F1 race is almost 2h. I'm pretty sure in 2024 it shouldn't be problem to get whole bunch of sensors on skis, boots and athletes, plus some POV cameras etc, but it's quite hard to pack all that data, all different camera views etc. into 50sec and not to make it way too much of info. XC skiing on the other side is something different, and something like this would actually make it way more interesting for normal people (hell even I don't watch 95% of xc races and xc skiing is still my no.1 sport). But alpine is hardly sport for that.
As far as "it's unchanged for 50 years" goes.... most of sports are. F1 racing is still same as it was 50 years ago, football (or american football) is still same as 50 years ago, basketball, hockey, athletics it's all same. Skiing actually has way more "innovations" then any other sport, regardless if it's super-g races, parallel events or ski cross, but on the end it's still someone on two planks in skinsuit going down the hill. We can't mount rocket and parachute to them and send them to edge of space and still consider it as skiing.

 

[Tom Holtmann]

I know we all love skiing (one way or the other), but let's be real... there's so much money in whole skiing all together, then Horner spends nowadays, when Verstappen and Marko doesn't join him, for his lunch on Thursday before show starts. So comparing what F1 is doing and what skiing is doing is a bit off. Another thing is, skiing run is 50-120sec. F1 race is almost 2h. I'm pretty sure in 2024 it shouldn't be problem to get whole bunch of sensors on skis, boots and athletes, plus some POV cameras etc, but it's quite hard to pack all that data, all different camera views etc. into 50sec and not to make it way too much of info. XC skiing on the other side is something different, and something like this would actually make it way more interesting for normal people (hell even I don't watch 95% of xc races and xc skiing is still my no.1 sport). But alpine is hardly sport for that.
As far as "it's unchanged for 50 years" goes.... most of sports are. F1 racing is still same as it was 50 years ago, football (or american football) is still same as 50 years ago, basketball, hockey, athletics it's all same. Skiing actually has way more "innovations" then any other sport, regardless if it's super-g races, parallel events or ski cross, but on the end it's still someone on two planks in skinsuit going down the hill. We can't mount rocket and parachute to them and send them to edge of space and still consider it as skiing.

We are obviously howling at the moon here. What you are missing is that the coverage in the US is just one symptom of a sport that is far behind the times in how the business of the sport is run. Every one of the sports you mentioned blow Alpine Skiing away in terms of how they are run. To me Alpine Skiing is basically similar to how Tennis was run before 1968 when the players finally had enough of backward national associations running the game and went out on their own. In 1968 the total purse at US Open was $100,000 and today it is $20 million. Unless they get rid of the national associations and FIS running the show and get a strong centralized organization I think we will see much of the same for a long time. But I think we should just agree to disagree!!

 

[Ivan]

So comparing what F1 is doing and what skiing is doing is a bit off.

We can compare it to rugby instead. There isn't a lot of money in rugby union; still, for all major international tournaments, extended highlights are available on YouTube. On top of that, World Rugby posts video with Nigel Owens (former international rugby union referee, possibly the best rugby union referee in history) where he analyzes all big decisions in major tournaments.

I understand that skiing will never be as popular as F1, but there are still things that can be done fairly easily. This is not rocket science.

 

[Primoz]

@Tom Holtmann I wrote before already and will for one last time. This, that you can't follow skiing in USA has nothing to do with FIS and how sport is run. It has to do with lack of YOUR (your and everyone else in USA) interest in skiing and that's reason why your broadcasters don't bother to buy right and have skiing on TV or internet streams. It really is as simple as that and regardless how much you hate FIS for whatever reason you have, FIS really has absolutely nothing to do with your inability to follow World cup on TV in USA. If someone would be interested in this, they would buy right and run this on TV. Unless you think FIS should make their own broadcasting station in USA and show WC races there free of charge.
Otherwise I totally agree FIS is typical sport federation run by 80 years old farts (ok nowadays just moronic self centered ego maniac) who lost contact with current world ages ago. But again, this has nothing to do with no WC racing on US tv.

 

[RiesenSL]

For the Finals next week, men will race on the new women's DH course. After some team members trained on it last week, Austrian speed manager Sepp Brunner said "it is not really spectacular, for men." Apparently it's too much work to maintain and secure two DH courses at same time, especially in spring.

Next February, at Saalbach World Champs, men will use their own, higher DH course (which shares the bottom half of the women's track).

 

[4ster]

Odermatt
Meillard
HK

 

[James]

Odermatt
Meillard
Kranjec

 

[BrianB]

Fun fact: last WC GS in Saalbach was Dec. 19, 2018. Kranjec won with a time of 2:50.08, which seems like a really long GS, and Meillard was 2nd

 

[DocGKR]

Holy Cow, Odermatt didn't win. Meillard in 1st, Verdu 2nd, Tumler 3rd.

Audi FIS Ski World Cup Saalbach (AUT)

www.fis-ski.com

 

[Mike King]

Holy Cow, Odermatt didn't win. Meillard in 1st, Verdu 2nd, Tumler 3rd.

Audi FIS Ski World Cup Saalbach (AUT)

www.fis-ski.com

Not only didn't win, didn't finish! I wonder what happened,,.,

 

[RiesenSL]

 

[RiesenSL]

Steen Olsen out back at the shed chopping wood ...

 

[geepers]

Not only didn't win, didn't finish! I wonder what happened,,.,

 

[Cat1210]

^ He said he made a silly mistake trying to accelerate too quickly. Obviously upset with himself but happy for Meillard and Tumler.

I think the odds and pressure just caught up with him. He’s gotten really lucky a few times to keep the streak going and it had to end at some point. Also his first DNF in GS since 2021, which is crazy to think about.

 

[Noodler]

Not only didn't win, didn't finish! I wonder what happened,,.,

Shit snow. I know plenty of other racers handled it just fine, but they are going to have to get a firm grip on the reality of climate change and be a bit more "nimble on their feet" so that they can adjust the schedule and the venues.

 

[James]

Wondering when they’re going to make a fatter gs and slalom ski for these super soft snow days. I remember being at Killington 2 yrs ago for the slalom. It was ridiculously soft. It took forever for someone to beat one of the early starters 2nd run.

 

[RiesenSL]

I think the odds and pressure just caught up with him. He’s gotten really lucky a few times to keep the streak going and it had to end at some point.

I think he has passed peak intensity of seasonal motivation. He's accomplished so much this year, no need to add to the big injury list. He's winding down, after being in celebration mode for many weeks. After the DNF he did not stop smiling and was laughing with people.