WORLD CUP BANSKO. Apparently former established champions as Alberto Tomba, Franz Klammer, Marc Girardelli, Hanni and Andreas Wenzel, Rosi Mittermaier, Janica Kostelic and Kjetil Aamodt have a few things in common: They were surely all huge stars in their best years and they were either Olympic and/or World Cup champions. And they all came to Bansko in Bulgaria at some point in their career – along with others like Michaela Dorfmeister or Gustav Thoeni.

The largest ski resort in the Balkan area is organizing its first men World Cup events this weekend, two years after having hosted the ladies tour a week after the 2009 FIS World Championships at Val d’Isère.

Its location is a two hours’ drive south of Sofia and less than two hundred kilometers from the northern border of Greece. Bansko has become one of the most cosmopolitan winter resorts in the ski world within a few years as thousands of visitors from nearby and far countries are gathering here each week.

Located on the west side of the Black Sea, Bulgaria is surrounded by several countries –such as Turkey, Greece, Serbia or Rumania - and not far from a dozen others such as Albania, Macedonia, Bosnia-Herzegovina. Sofia is also well connected to most European major towns and visitors from Russia, Ukraine, Poland, Israel, Libia, Malta, and Cyprus.

Charter flights handled by Balkan Holidays also pick-up tourists from Great-Britain, Ireland or Denmark, making it accessible to more than three hundred thousand individual skiers. All visitors enjoy their time in the Pirin Mountains, which are dominated by the Vihren Peak, the second highest in the country with its 2,914 meters.

During the weekends, the well groomed slopes above the medieval town of Bansko get pretty busy – especially the numerous high-altitude restaurants situated all around the place.

Ski races already took place on various slopes of the area in the late 1940s but recent development only started ten years ago when a group of Bulgarian and foreign businessmen decided to invest a lot of money on new lifts and up-to-date lodging facilities.

Nowadays, a dozen of modern ‘Dopplemayer’ lifts – including spacious gondolas and fast chairlifts – take the tourists up to the different slopes being regularly groomed by the local workers. A network of over two hundred snow guns takes care of the entire ski park.

Over 80 km of runs designed for beginners to experts have been built year after year on the mostly wooden slopes, the steepest being named the ‘Alberto Tomba’ run after the visit of the triple Olympic champion here in 2004.

Numerous foreign real-estate companies constructed thousands of condominiums in the new part of Bansko situated nearby the base station of the gondolas which transport the skiers up to the slopes. Over ten thousand hotel beds are at the disposal of visitors and travel agents, even in the summer. The agreeable climate, the nearby golf course, as well as bike and trekking runs attract numerous visitors between the ski seasons.

FISalpine.com
Saturday 26 February 2011

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