Germany's cross-country skiing team coach Peter Schlickenrieder admitted that there is a high risk of canceling a number of World Cup events in the upcoming season. The Europeans finished the game with sanctions, and in Russia they are preparing to hold a full-fledged competitive year.
No snow, no resources
The season in winter sports has not started yet, and the organizers already have a lot of problems. The International Ski and Snowboard Federation (FIS) is not sounding the alarm yet and pretending that everything is fine. Although the World Cups are on the verge of total collapse. In snowboarding, several stages have already been canceled, it seems that this is only the beginning. Problems with ski competitions were a matter of time. What are the massive cancellations of the World Cup last season due to the coronavirus. Although in the same biathlon athletes performed calmly, and in the same countries. Now things have gotten even worse. The removal of the Russian team will inevitably kill the intrigue in the race, because now there is no one to provide real competition to the Norwegians. But that's not all.Sanctions against Russia played against Europe as well. There are now crazy energy prices, which is why the organizers simply cannot provide normal coverage at the World Cup stages. It was possible to somehow resolve the issue and hold the race in the morning. But you still need to prepare artificial snow. It is no secret that in Europe there have been big problems with this in recent years. And in order to prepare snow, energy carriers are needed. Vicious circle. German ski coach Peter Schlickenrieder raised this issue in a conversation with local media. organizers produce a lot of snow. And it is an important basis for us. We will see the cancellation of the competition where the organizers decide not to produce snow", — quotes Schlickenrieder BR24. Russia is the opposite
FIS Secretary General Michel Vion also allowed the cancellation of the World Cup. The situation has changed. If earlier in the FIS they preferred to hush up the problem, now they are starting to carefully lay straws and openly consider the worst option. How to conduct the same «Tour de Ski» is completely incomprehensible. These are big expenses, which in the current situation can be simply unbearable for the organizers. sanctions. With something, but with snow in our country there are definitely no problems. Many skiers and biathletes are already working in winter mode. The competition will definitely not be cancelled.
There is a lot of snow, there are no problems with energy sources. There are also sponsors, the fans will certainly not ignore the internal starts. Many will want to see Alexander Bolshunov and Natalya Nepryaeva on the track.
It may come to the point that when returning to the world stage, Russian skiers will be in better shape than their foreign counterparts. The scenario is quite likely. It's just that Europe has not yet realized this.
The opinion of the author may not coincide with the position of the editors