A new Alpine World Cup season was set to begin this weekend in Soelden, Austria but Mother Nature had other ideas.
Rain and wet snow has made visibility poor and the soft course unsafe for skiing.
The start of the women’s race was initially delayed by an hour, but conditions never improved and the event was cancelled.
“We had a couple of hours of rain and then this wet snow around five or six o’clock this morning,” said FIS Women’s Race Director Peter Gerdol. “The surface was too soft to guarantee a safe race.”
Organizers said the weather outlook is more promising for the afternoon, and they are hopeful the men’s race will go on as scheduled Sunday.
This marks the first time since 2006 the women’s race of the traditional season-opener weekend in Soelden was cancelled, while the men’s race saw weather issues in both 2017 and 2018.
Last year winning the opener in Austria proved to be a good omen for both the American Mikaela Shiffrin and the Swiss skier Marco Odermatt. Both of them won the season opener and would go on to claim the overall World Cup title as well. It was Shiffrin’s fourth overall title and Odermatt’s first.
“It’s really, really, really wet outside. But air smells fresh and that’s nice but we won’t be racing today,” Shiffrin posted on Twitter.
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