Sochi Readies for Slopestyle Following IOC Approval

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(ATR) Nine of the 12 events new to the Winter Olympic program belong to the International Ski Federation.

IOC president Jacques Rogge confirmed the additions of ski slopestyle, snowboard slopestyle and snowboard parallel slalom during a July 4 meeting of the Executive Board in Durban, South Africa.

Now half of the 98 medal events in Sochi are split among the six FIS disciplines.

Come February 2014, freestyle skiing and snowboarding will share parts of courses at one venue in Sochi – the Rosa Khutor Snowboard Park and Freestyle Centre. Comprised of two stadiums and two distinct finish areas, the compact venue will be home to 20 medal events over 14 days of competition.

"It was specifically designed that way in anticipation that if freestyle halfpipe was in, we’d share the halfpipe and also share parts of the ski cross course, and then slopestyle came in so we had a venue designed with a very open situation." FIS freestyle director Joe Fitzgerald tells Around the Rings.

In Vancouver 2010, six medal events were contested in both freestyle and snowboarding. With the additions from Durban as well as the ski halfpipe events added by the IOC in April, each FIS discipline will now host 10 events, equal to that of the more traditional alpine skiing.

"What we’re doing in Sochi compared to Vancouver is that we’ll have two separate stadiums at the venue and one of them will have the possibility of running almost all events at night," FIS snowboarding director Uwe Beier told ATR.

"We will have competitions in the morning, afternoon and evening, so from the beginning this gives us more flexibility with the schedule and still enough space for reserve days."

Sochi organizers as well as the FIS hope to stage as many finals under the lights as possible.

"The goal is to have events like halfpipe, moguls, and aerials at night," Beier said, "and we are also looking into options for the snowboarding parallel events.

"It’s more complicated, but an additional goal of ours that will make for a great show."

Fitzgerald added that staging 20 events over a 14-day timeframe presents "quite complex" a challenge.

"The scope of the whole thing coming back to scheduling is amazing how we’ll fit everything in," he said.

The alpine events will take place at another nearby venue less than two kilometers away. Thirty events in total will be contested at the two neighboring venues in the Sochi mountain cluster.

New Vision for the IOC

Snowboarding was first included in the Olympic program at the 1998 Nagano Games with the halfpipe and giant slalom events. Snowboard cross was then added for Torino in 2006, and the recent IOC approvals of slopestyle and parallel slalom bring the total number of medal events in the sport to 10, five each for men and women.

"Snowboarding is a grown-up Olympic discipline now and with the new events is even more attractive to youth and additional target groups which I guess is important for the Olympic movement and also within FIS," said Beier.

"It’s the next step to get to the next level for snowboarding."

Freestyle skiing, meanwhile, was first contested at the 1992 Albertville Games with the moguls event. Aerials was added two years later in Lillehammer, and ski cross joined the program for Vancouver 2010.

Fitzgerald echoed the sentiments of Beier with regard to what appears to be a new, more progressive IOC.

"They made a direction-changing decision and we have a clear direction into the future on our discipline side," he said.

"I think it sets the tone of what kids want to do as they come up through the system wanting to compete; slopestyle is very broad-based and widespread around the world."

Like her rival riders, three-time X Games women’s gold medalist Jamie Anderson of the U.S. hopes to become an Olympian now that her sport is part of the Winter Games.

"Slopestyle is such a progressive event and has become more popular over the last few years. Nothing thrills me more to see the sport that I love recognized on the world’s stage," she said.

FIS president Gian-Franco Kasper and secretary general Sarah Lewis played instrumental roles in recent years championing all new events for inclusion into the Olympic program by the IOC.

Next season, Europa Cup test events in both snowboarding and freestyle skiing are scheduled for the Sochi venue in March.

"I’m quite confident; they’ve done a really good job with the construction so far and their experts working on the slope are making good progress," Beier said about ongoing event preparations.

The slopestyle events, which involve athletes navigating through a terrain park of obstacles, rails, jumps and other features while performing various tricks, will not be tested at the Sochi venue until World Cup events in 2013.

"With slopestyle and snowboard cross, there has to be a good relation and integration of the obstacles, the jumps and their distances on the slope, so there will be more focus because it is more difficult to build these courses for athletes to perform at the highest level," Beier told ATR.

"The biggest test with slopestyle will be the following winter when we’ll conduct all of the Olympic disciplines at what we hope is a very high level," he added of the World Cup test event in March 2013.

Between December 2011 and September 2013, a total of 74 test events, 27 of them international, are scheduled to take place at the 11 Sochi venues.

"Not only are they doing our events, but also tests with so-called Continental Cups for every sport and every event," Fitzgerald said of the organizers.

"That airport in Sochi will have a lot of traffic with all types of events being held."

Written by Brian Pinelli.