World Cup heads quietly into season full of questions
VIENNA — The usual jitters before Alpine skiing’s World Cup season opener won’t be limited to the racers this weekend.
Organizers, sponsors and fans will be just as anxious about the 2020-21 campaign, which starts amid rising numbers of coronavirus cases across Europe.
Even before its traditional start in Soelden, Austria, on Saturday, the season is surrounded by many questions — and they are not just about whowill wintheraces.
The American and Canadian swing in Novemberand December was canceled and partly replaced by events in Europe, and the men’s and women’s circuits have been kept apart as much as possible
But can all 38 men’s and34 women’sraces onthecurrent calendar take place as scheduled?
What about the Feb. 8-21 world championships in Cortina d’Ampezzo? Or the Feb. 24-28Olympictest event in Yanqing, China?
There are questions about travel restrictions, testing and how racers will perform after their mostly hampered offseason preparations.
Atleast the start in Soelden has a familiar touch because the competition program of the traditional kickoff event has not changed, with a women’s giant slalom Saturday and a men’s race Sunday.
In previous seasons, around 15,000 fans per race would travel up to the Rettenbach glacier, but this weekend no visitors, apart from 200 invited guests, are allowed on the hill when Federica Brignone and Aleksander Aamodt Kilde start the defense of their overall World Cup titles.
The event was brought forward byoneweektoavoid tourist crowds and shield World Cup teams and officials from the outside world.
Virus testing will take place uponarrival in Soelden before participants are allocated to one of the four “bubbles” separating teams and officials from workers, media and invited guests.
A similar protocol will be applied to the next races in Lech/Zuers in Austria on Nov. 13 and 14, and in the remote resort of Levi in Finland the following week.
After its rather quiet start, however, the World Cup in December is scheduled to travel to crowded winter sports hot spots such as Sankt Moritz in Switzerland and Val d’Isere in France.
The Swiss Ski Federation on Friday announced fans will be banned from all its races in the entire winter.
While the International Ski Federation has set guidelines concerning virus risk management, local organizers also have their ownrules.
Shiffrin’s comeback
The women’s World Cup season starts Saturday without a string of familiar names, including Mikaela Shiffrin, Viktoria Rebensburg, Tina Weirather and Anna Veith.
But while the latter three have all retired, Shiffrin is out with a back injury. The American three-time overall champion stayed in Soelden for training earlier this week.
“My goals are staying the same; I don’t knowwhatelse I could shoot for,” Shiffrin said about her season. “I still try to be as fast as I can and it’s not really different from any other year. I want to win the races, but I have to focus on my skiing to do that.”