ALPINE SKI WORLD CUP. LENZERHEIDE, Switzerland – Due to lack of freezing temperatures overnight and resulting snow conditions, the final World Cup women’s giant slalom race in Lenzerheide is canceled.

“It is basically the same situation that we saw yesterday for the men’s race,” said FIS women’s World Cup race director Atle Skaardal. “There is a crust on top of the snow and nothing underneath. It’s impossible to ski on such a soft crust. The situation is not skiable for a GS race.”

The race course was also shrouded in a thick fog on Saturday morning as a light snow fell.

On Friday, the men’s final GS race was canceled in Lenzerheide and the women’s slalom race was held on a very carefully treated course in which the same gate set had to be used for both runs. Throughout Friday’s slalom race, course workers constantly had to re-drill gates into the snow. It will be a similar situation for the men’s slalom race on Saturday, which is delayed until 10 a.m. so officials can finish up applying water and chemicals to the course.

“You can’t do the same job for a GS course,” Skaardal said of the process that enables the slalom race to take place. “For slalom it’s a different situation. You can do something with water and chemicals. It is a shorter course. On the GS course, we are putting the machine 20 centimeters into the snow without any resistance. We need minus temperatures for the snow and this didn’t happen overnight.”

Per FIS rules, canceled races at World Cup Finals will not be rescheduled. This is because in a case such as that in Lenzerheide, in which weather conditions force the cancelation of more than one race, there are no reserve days to ensure that all canceled races will be rescheduled and officials point out that it would be unfair to reschedule one race and not another.

“We can’t calculate World Cup points,” Skaardal said. “We are here to make decisions about putting on safe and fair races.”

Thus titles for the 2010-2011 season will be given to leaders in the standings. With 435 points, Germany’s Viktoria Rebensburg takes the giant slalom globe as France’s Tessa Worley, with 358 points, takes second and with 240, Tanja Poutiainen takes third.

Maria Riesch takes the World Cup overall title with 1728 points and Lindsey Vonn finishes second in the standings with 1725 and Tina Maze third with 1139.

Comments and details of racers thoughts on the outcome of the World Cup season will be posted later today.

The men’s slalom race kicks off at 10 a.m. with second run at 12:30 in Lenzerheide.

FISalpine.com
Saturday 19 March 2011