J2Ski Forum Posts and Replies by J2SkiNews

The public funding body UK Sport, has announced awards of £2.749 million to Para-Alpine skiing and £4.89 million to the British Ski and Snowboard to cover the four year run-up to the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympic and Winter Paralympic Games in South Korea.

The money follows the UK's best ever performances in Alpine sports at both the Sochi Winter Olympic and Winter Paralympic Games earlier this year.

"This is great news that UK Sport has recognised the achievements and hard work put in by the athletes, the British Disabled Ski Team and Disability Snowsport UK over the last three funding cycles," said Fiona Young, CEO of Disability Snowsport UK, the charity which runs the British Disabled Ski Team,

"Discussions will now take place on the best way to utilise this funding and take the BDST forward."

British Ski and Snowboard also welcomed their funding, which is a significant increase on the £1.51 million they received from UK sport in January 2012 for a nearly three-year period ending this September. During the previous two years British Ski and Snowboard received no public money at all.

"The level of funding is reflective of the current talent in our Park and Pipe programme and it will allow us as a governing body to maintain world class performance programmes and offer even more support systems for these athletes," said Dave Edwards, Chief Executive of British Ski and Snowboard.

British Ski and Snowboard athletes finished with six top ten results at Sochi 2014 including Jenny Jones' Olympic Bronze medal in Snowboard Slopestyle, plus five more athletes finished in the top 20 and another three in the top 30.

Although exactly how the money, which will go in to a pot that also includes investment in our national team from the National Lottery and private sponsors led by Delancey, will be allocated among athletes is not yet known, it seems likely that the onus of 'rewards for results' will continue, meaning much if not all of funding being concentrated on freestyle events.

"We will now continue to move forward and develop athletes who will compete and aim to beat the world's best over the next four years and in Pyeongchang in 2018," said Mr Edwards.

It is unclear whether there will be any British competitors in traditional Alpine downhill skiing events moving forward. The UK's only 2014 Olympian was Chemmy Alcott who has now retired, as has T J Baldwin who was not selected for the British team for Sochi, despite meeting IOC criteria, and announced he has decided this week that the battle for funding combined with the risk of injury was no longer worth it for him to continue.

UK Sport funding is based around athletes who are identified as having the ability to 'Podium' or are deemed to have 'Podium Potential'. This applies to athletes in the Park and Pipe programme.

Disability Snowsport: www.disabilitysnowsport.org.uk
British Ski and Snowboard: www.teambss.org.uk
UK Sport / National Lottery: www.uksport.gov.uk
Delancey: www.delancey.com

A ski charity is looking for teams to compete in its challenge to ski across the Portes du Soleil across the French/Swiss border and raise funds in the process.

The Snow Camp Alpine Challenge involves teams of 4-5 riders covering 150km on the piste over two days. Last year the event raised over £40,000 to be raised for innovative youth charity Snow Camp.

The event takes participants across 15 ski resorts on the giant pass and not only involves 150km of GPS tracked skiing or snowboarding over two non-stop days but also night snow-showshoeing action.

"The event is all about strategy, stamina, teamwork and fun but best of all, it's for a great cause," said a statement from Snow-camp, "Contenders not only have the opportunity to pack as much skiing, snowboarding into the shortest space of time possible, but they also help raise funds to support inner city young people."

Funds raised help provide inner-city young people the opportunity to participate in the Snow Camp youth training programmes. Involvement in these snowsports programmes, which initially take place on dry slopes and indoor snow slopes in the UK, has proved positively life-changing for the majority of young people that have experienced the Snow Camp programme.

The Alpine Challenge 2015 takes place from 12th-15th March 2015 and is based in Morzine. Snow-Camp are partnering with tour operator Ski Weekends which is offering heavily discounted packages (including accommodation, flights, transfers and ski hire) exclusively to those participating in the Challenge weekend.

"Participants will typically save £100+ which will cover the registration fee. We also pledge that 100% of profit on all the Alpine Challenge bookings made through us will go directly to Snow-Camp fundraising," said Dan Fox, Managing Director of Ski Weekends.

Although the event lasts two days Ski Weekends packages are available for 4 or 7 nights, as well as 3 nights, over this period if participants wish to stay on longer.

Registration is £100 per person (£400 per team) and includes entry to the event, bibs, GPS tracking, medals and certificates, fundraising support from the Snow-Camp team, hog roast and a free drink on the first night of the event and, of course, entrance to the après ski party!

A video of last year's event is available here::
The event's link is here: www.snow-camp.org.uk/events/alpinechallenge

After its dry start to the season on June 7th following a 'warmest ever' May, Australia is now seeing one of its biggest snow storms with up to 1.2m of snow fall over the last 72 hours – and it is still falling.

There are 19 lifts open at the continent's largest resort, Perisher, which promises more terrain and lifts will open as the storm clears – which is expected towards the weekend.

These are scheduled to include the resort's new $4million Freedom Quad Chairlift.

Hotham reported 50cm of snow during the first 24 hours of the storm and have opened their Summit Trainer, the Big D, Upper Playground, Summit Quad, Road Runner and the Village Chair lifts.

"We are also opening the Dinner Plain lift on Friday if everything goes to plan," said a resort spokesperson, " Plus our teams are working tirelessly which means we will open even more lifts for the school holidays."

June 21st is quite a significant day on the world calendar for ski area openings.

Most South American ski areas that have not already opened are scheduled to open on Saturday – the shortest day of the year in the southern hemisphere. Snowfall through the first half of May has been excellent across the continent and many areas opened early already, but some, like Valle Nevado, having partially opened two weeks ago, will be fully open from this weekend.

In the Northern Hemisphere, where this Saturday both Les 2Alpes and Tignes are due to open for glacier skiing in France, with their summer ski seasons lasting through to August.

Starting this weekend at Tignes (pictured above), the funicular, cable car and Vanoise chairlift can be used again to access the Glacier, Descente, Rimaye, Face, Rabotch and Dahu pistes. The open area will expand on July 5th with the whole glacier area open, including the snowpark.

As we reported yesterday Glencoe in Scotland will briefly run its lifts for midsummer and they're skiing at midnight under the midnight sun for midsummer at Riksgransen in Sweden.

Meanwhile across the Atlantic it's the last Saturday of the nearly nine month ski season at Arapahoe Basin in Colorado which closes Sunday, leaving only Timberline in Oregon still open.

It's not all good news in the southern hemisphere however as The Remarkables in New Zealand, which was due to open tomorrow, has delayed doing so due to weather conditions.

Sweden's famous northern ski area of Riksgransen is re-opening this morning at the start of its annual midsummer ski weekend.

Located 200km north of the Arctic Circle, there has been 24 hour daylight here for the past month, but after a ski season running from February to May, the centre has been closed for the first three weeks of June before this final special weekend celebration. The limited accommodation available is normally booked out months ahead.

The ski lifts will begin running at 10pm tonight and stay open until around 1am so that people can ski through midnight.

Midsummer remains quite a big event in Scandinavia and Riksgransen will offer other themed events throughout the weekend including a midnight dance around the maypole.

Closer to home the operators of Glencoe ski area in Scotland have announced they'll run the lifts there at 10am on Saturday June 21st, the longest day and first day of summer, for half an hour to allow skiers and boarders easy access to the remaining snowfields there. After the huge accumulations last winter, large areas remain, but the centre warns there's no grooming, no snow patrol and plenty of natural hazards, so it's for good skiers and boarders only and at their own risk.

http://en.riksgransen.se/sidor/event/19-22-juni-midsommar.aspx

Simon Butler, the ski teacher who was charged with teaching in France without qualifications accepted to teach in France by the French has escaped a jail sentence, but has been handed a €30,000 (approximately £24,000) fine. Mr Butler may still be jailed if he does not pay it. Five ski instructors employed by Mr Butler were fined a further €20,000 in total.

Mr Butler argued that he believes his qualifications are in fact enough for him to be able to teach in France, particularly under EC which allow for equal employment rights. After the ruling he said he plans to appeal.

Before the trial, which is one of several which have been brought against Mr Butler over the years, Mr Butler said he would move his business out of France if he lost the case. He has worked in the country for around 30 years.

UKIP, who have been backing Mr Butler said in a statement from deputy leader Paul Nuttall,
"This is a blatant display of national discrimination by the French government and legal system who will stop at nothing to discourage or prevent non-French nationals from giving ski lessons on French slopes. It really does show that discrimination is rampant in the EU. While the British government gold-plates EU legislation, other countries like France ignore it at will."

The case is one of three currently going through French courts involving British ski organisations. The other two relate to ski hosting and ski guiding operations by British tour operators and the Ski Club of Great Britain.

France is believed to be the only country where there are such issues with British instructors, guides and hosts.

Val d'Isere is scheduled to have re-opened this week, the first ski area in France to operate ski lifts since Tignes and Val Thorens ended their long 2013-14 winter seasons a month ago.

It's the first of the four French summer ski destinations to open for 2014, with the two 'big hitters' Les 2 Alpes, which claims to have Europe's largest skiable glacier, and Tignes (again) scheduled to open in just a week's time on June 21st.

Alpe d'Huez, which began occasional summer operations again last summer after about a decade of not opening in summer, says it also will open when conditions are good from early July.

In fact the period when all four French glacier areas are operational simultaneously looks likely to be less than a fortnight long, as the Pissaillas glacier above Val d'Isere has only a five week summer ski season again and closes again on July 13th, while the other three plan to open through July and much of August.

Les 2 Alpes just sent the picture above of how their glacier is currently looking – essentially good they say. Indeed all four areas have had substantial fresh snowfall since closing last month.

Les 2 Alpes is set to host around 1,500 skiers and snowboarders a day following good spring precipitation. The glacier is also a magnet for ski professionals who come to traint here in the summer. There are always plenty of slalom courses set up and for the freestylers there is an 18 hectare snow park for all levels of skiers and snowboarders.

South America is off to an excellent start to the 2014 ski season with heavy snowfall reported across the continent's ski regions for the past few weeks.

Lagunillas in Chile was the first area in the entire southern hemisphere to open for the season, a week ago today, and now Valle Nevado has announced it will be opening two weeks ahead of schedule, this Friday, June 13th.

The heavy snowfall has built pre-season bases to very healthy levels at several resorts, Portillo, which has confirmed plans to open in June 21st, reports the last snow storm there, which ended on Monday, totalled 1.5m (five feet).

While El Niño weather patterns have forecasted favourable snow weather conditions for the central Andes this year, the amount of snow received in the past few weeks has exceeded expectations, and promises an even better season than previously expected.

Valle Nevado currently has nearly 90cm/three feet of snow, with more flurries predicted in the rest of this week's forecast.

Valle Nevado's hotels will remain closed until June 27, however most trails, select restaurants and other services will open for day skiers and those lodging in condominiums.