It was the opening day of the Olympic season this
week as the Utah Olympic Park and the Ounasvaara
hill in Rovaniemi opened to ski jumpers Tuesday,
Nov. 12 - the first day any jumps in the world were
available for training.
Top U.S. men's and women's ski jumpers plus the
U.S. Nordic Combined Ski Team were on hand in Park
City. The Utah Olympic Park crews invested 91 hours
in snowmaking, pumping 350,000 gallons of water
onto the K90 Olympic jump with 10 snowmakers working
around the clock. The early opening allowed U.S.
athletes to train at home in preparation for the
World Cup seasons which begin later this month in
Europe.
Traditionally a place where many teams make their
first snow jumps, the HS100 hill in Rovaniemi attracted
the Japanse, Polish, Estonian, Russian and Finnish
Nordic Combined teams who work on last technical
details and can have a first look at some of the
competitors before the season kicks off in Kuusamo
on the 30th of November.
Another group of teams, namely the Norwegian, Czech,
French and Austrian squads are currently about to
gather in Lillehammer, Norway, another "hot
spot" of final season preparations. For the
Norwegian team which just returned from a cross-country
camp in Beitostoelen, the season pretty much starts
one weekend earlier already with the important national
championships in Beitostoelen on the 22nd of November.
Stay tuned for more information on fis-ski.com!