New touches boost Games
When it comes to the alpine skiing events that are always so thrilling, these are not your old-school Olympic Games that will open in PyeongChang this weekend. Besides the huge leaps in equipment technology that allow skiers to extend their careers (and ski faster), the U.S. ski team and others are in a new era of technology and skiing. Consider these new touches as you watch this year:
• Virtual reality plays a huge part in each run. While skiers once had to rely on memory if they’d skied a trail before and film if they had not, the U.S. team this year has embraced virtual reality to help prepare for their big races. In downhill, particularly, gate placement does not change much from race to race, so this is beneficial.
Racers were concerned about this year’s downhill in PyeongChang. Olympic events often take place on courses World Cup skiers have raced many times, allowing them a familiarity of where to speed up, how to take corners, etc. This course, located in the Taebaek mountains about 90 miles east of Seoul, basically will be a mystery other than a few training runs come event time.
But thanks to virtual reality headsets, skiers can “take the course,” memorizing undulations, turns and the feel of the course. This means instead of being new to the course, most American racers will have experienced it (in a 360 degree virtual system) almost countless times. This should lead to a better plan on the hill and, Americans hope, faster, stronger runs.
• A new team ski race has been added, but not all skiers are thrilled. Set up like the NCAA basketball brackets, the team races pit 16 countries against one another. Each squad will have four members, two men and two women (plus one of each gender as a reserve).
In each matchup, there will be four one-on-one parallel runs lasting about 20-25 seconds through giant slalom-type gates on the bottom portion of a slalom course. It is thought to be a great spectator addition to the games, but some Americans are hinting they will opt out of that race and instead focus on training for the rest of the World Cup circuit. Lindsay Vonn told the reporters she felt the team event was not a good idea, and that she expects most top athletes to opt out. Time will tell.
• NBC announced that 2,400 hours of Olympic events will be shown live across a variety of platforms, meaning true fans won’t have to avoid social media spoilers or suffer through coverage that cuts the meat of events out, something particularly meaningful to ski fans.
• Hingham’s Alice Merryweather (who skis for Stratton Mountain School) is a late addition to the team because of an injury. Merryweather learned to embrace speed as a child skiing with her family at Attitash Mountain in New Hampshire. Look for her to fare best in downhill, where she is a junior champion.