Val Gardena Men's Alpine Ski World Cup Speed Weekend
- Raúl Revuelta
- 2 days ago
- 5 min read
The 58th Saslong Classic in Val Gardena/Gröden will take place on the last weekend before Christmas.
After the races in Copper Mountain and Beaver Creek, the Saslong Classic will be the speed athletes' third stop of the Alpine Ski World Cup season.
In 2025, the South Tyrolean ski resort will host three races, two Downhills and a Super-G.
The Saslong will receive special recognition on Thursday as the race marks the 1,000th Alpine Ski World Cup Downhill event. So far, a total of 541 Downhill races have taken place for Men, and 458 for Women.
Val Gardena / Groeden (ITA)
December 18th Downhill /Men (replacement for Beaver Creek) 11:45 CET
December 19th Super-G / Men 11:45 CET
December 20th Downhill / Men 11:45 CET
Training sessions have been scheduled for Tuesday, 16th, and Wednesday, 17th.
This is not the first time Val Gardena has hosted such a triple header; another one happened in 2023 when Bryce Bennett won the sprint Downhill, Vincent Kriechmayr was 1st in the Super-G, and Dominik Paris topped the podium in the second Downhill of the weekend. Paris' win ended a streak of 22 races on the Saslong without a win for Italy after Kristian Ghedina’s victory in 2001.
Austria is the most successful nation in the Val Gardena Downhill, having claimed 19 wins to date. Switzerland has 15 victories, Norway 8. Italy is in 4th place with six wins on the home slopes.
Norway is the most successful nation in Val Gardena Super-G history, having claimed 10 wins to date. Austria has five, Switzerland four.
Three Norwegian athletes lead the list of the most podiums in the Val Gardena Super-G record: Kjetil Jansrud (7), Aksel Lund Svindal (5), and Aleksander Aamodt Kilde (4).
Val Gardena is home to the Saslong Classic, one of the iconic Men's World Cup Downhill races. A total of 63 Downhill and 23 Super-G World Cup races have been held there to date.
The Saslong course is considered one of the five "classic" Men's Downhill races, along with Garmisch-Partenkirchen's Kandahar, Kitzbühel's Hahnenkamm, Wengen's Lauberhorn, and Val-d'Isère's Criterium de la Première Neige (FRA).
With seven World Cup victories (five in the Super-G and two in the Downhill), the Norwegian Aksel Lund Svindal is the most successful skier on the Saslong.
Austrian Franz Klammer (1975, two races in 1976, and 1982), and Italian Kristian Ghedina (1996, 1998, 1999, and 2001) won the Downhill in Val Gardena four times.
In 1967, the International Ski Federation decided to host the Ski World Championships in the valley in 1970. The first World Cup race was held in Val Gardena/Gröden on February 14th, 1969.
The FIS Alpine World Ski Championships 1970 were held in Val Gardena from February 8 to 15, 1970. For the first time, results from the World Championships were included in the World Cup points standings, which were then in their fourth season.
After more than 50 years, the FIS Alpine World Ski Championships will be back in Val Gardena in 2031. On June 4, 2024, at the 55th FIS Congress in Reykjavik, Iceland, the International Ski and Snowboard Federation (FIS) announced that Narvik will host the 2029 Alpine World Ski Championships. The 2031 Alpine World Ski Championships were also awarded during this session. FIS decided to award two World Championships due to the high caliber of the bids.
Since 1972, Val Gardena has become a traditional venue of the World Cup races. In 1975, Val Gardena/Gröden hosted the World Cup Finals for the first and only time.
Since 2002, the Downhill has been paired with a Super-G race, and from 1979 to 1982, a combined event was held.
Start altitude: 2,249m (DH), 2,000m (SG)
Finish altitude: 1,410m
Elevation difference: 839m (DH), 590m (SG)
Length: 3,446m (DH), 2,415m (SG)
Steepest section: 56.9%
Lowest gradient: 11.2 %
Average gradient: 24.5%
The Camel Humps represent the most spectacular section of the Saslong. They were named by the late and former Austrian FIS TD Sepp Sulzberger. Uli Spiess from Austria was the first athlete to attempt and succeed in jumping all three Humps at once, rather than taking each jump separately. Since Spiess' premiere, skiers today mostly absorb the first jump (a.k.a. "Girardelli Line") and leap from the second over the third. The record jump belongs to Austrian skier Michael Walchhofer, who leaped 88 meters, reaching a height of 4-5 meters in 2003.
Last season, Italian Mattia Casse won the Super-G on the Saslong in Val Gardena. He took his first victory in the Alpine Ski World Cup at the age of 34 in his 200th Alpine Ski World Cup race.
This was the second time he had finished in the top three in the South Tyrolean resort. The Italian claimed one of his three previous World Cup podiums in Val Gardena. On 17 December 2022, Casse finished third in the Downhill on the Saslong.
US skier Jared Goldberg finished second, just 0.01 seconds behind Casse, to claim his first Alpine World Cup podium in 168 races at the age of 33. His previous best result was a fourth place in the Kitzbühel downhill in January 2023.
Marco Odermatt finished third, 0.43 seconds behind Casse.
The 57th Saslong Classic in Val Gardena closed with a big bang for the Swiss Team. Marco Odermatt led a 1-2 Swiss podium ahead of teammate Franjo von Allmen. Odermatt won the Downhill thanks to a superb performance in the Ciaslat sector. It's Switzerland's first victory in Val Gardena since Silvan Zurbriggen's in 2010. The defending Downhill and Overall World Cup champion won for the first time on the Saslong racecourse.
Franjo Von Allmen finished second, 0.45 seconds behind the winner. He celebrated his first World Cup podium in the Downhill. In January 2024, the 24-year-old talent achieved his first World Cup podium in the Super-G in Garmisch-Partenkirchen.
Ryan Cochran-Siegle finished in third place, 0.46 seconds behind Odematt, completing a perfect speed weekend for the US Team after Goldberg's podium. It's Cochran-Siegle's first podium in the World Cup in almost four years.
Val Gardena-Gröden is a Valley in Northern Italy, in the Dolomites of South Tyrol.
Val Gardena and the three splendid villages of Ortisei, S. Cristina, and the picturesque Selva Gardena, surrounded by the scenery of the Dolomites, are part of the Dolomiti Superski, a world-famous network of 12 ski resorts and over 1200 km of slopes in the Dolomites, accessible with just one ski pass.
The Dolomites Val Gardena/Alpe di Siusi ski area is connected by lifts to the Sella Ronda sector of the Dolomiti Superski Pass. The Sella Ronda is probably the third-largest ski area in the world, with over 500 km of lifts.
Since 2016, the fastest racer of the Ski World Cup in Val Gardena/Gröden has won an additional prize.
The winner of the so-called DOLOMITES Val Gardena South Tyrol Ski Trophy can look forward to an authentic 3D wooden bust, extra prize money of 5,000 euros, a short stay in Val Gardena/Gröden, and a climb of the Sassolungo/Langkofel accompanied by a local expert mountain guide. The DOLOMITES Val Gardena Südtirol Ski Trophy in Val Gardena/Gröden will be awarded to the racer who scores the most World Cup points in the three races.
Aleksander Aamodt Kilde has won the additional prize four times (2022, 2020, 2018, and 2017). Kjetil Jansrud, Rasmus Windingstad, Bryce Bennett, and Marco Odermatt also made it onto the winners' list.
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