That was a great day!
Winning with Bib 29 caused quite a stir in the Finish Area. The stories were almost written and then Italy’s Sofia Goggia (Bib 28) came down and shocked the class of the field with a solid run THEN Slovenia’s Ilka Stuhec came down and topped everyone. It was Ilka’s first World Cup Podium let alone first WC win. Congrats to her!
Winning from that position is a true credit to your track preparation. Things just better and better as the race progressed. You guys definitely delivered your A game today.
DH 2 is tomorrow. Breakfast and lifts are early, early – so have a quick breakfast and remember your Petzl. Stay fuelled up – Saturday is always our longest day. We need to be race ready for the Downhill and then transition to SuperG and be ready for an earlier Sunday start time.
I spent much of the day watching the event in the Finish Area. The stands were packed. Alberta Alpine’s sponsored Speed Sisters program had many young racers cheering every racer and getting autographs. Drew Bragg & Brian Stemmle did a great job of announcing the race. They were both informative and entertaining….in both official languages. The Video Wall was great. It captured all the action including how well the A net/Vexar system worked at Waterfall. Even after a direct hit, the athlete was able to ski down under her own power. It is exactly why we make such an effort with the installation of our safety systems.
What I just received from Bob Leitch, Chief of Race – Lake Louise NorAm Downhill ROC who will inherit our race track on Sunday afternoon:
On behalf of the Lake Louise NorAm Downhill ROC we wanted to pass on our sincerest thanks to all of the Winterstart hard working volunteers and paid staff for, again, putting together a world class race and track. It is only because of your teams efforts that our NorAm event and the ‘next generation’ of Canadian World Cup stars have the opportunity to race such a quality track, gain valuable experience and hopefully one day some home field advantage.
Thank you Winterstart for you unwavering commitment to this great sport and development of our future athletes!Well done.
Sincerest best regards,
Bob
Nama-ski,
Brian