Val d'Isere Women's Alpine Ski World Cup Speed Weekend

This winter "The Critérium de la Première Neige à Val d'Isère" celebrates its 70th anniversary. Since 1968, Val d'Isere has been a key stop on the Alpine Ski World Cup calendar.

The Women’s Downhill and Super-G events of the Critérium de la Première Neige will be held on 16th and 17th December 2023 in the Oreiller-Killy (the OK) course at La Daille.

Val d'Isere (FRA)

December 20th Downhill / Women 10:30 LOC

December 21st Super-G / Women 11:00 LOC

The Oreiller-Killy racecourse, known as the OK piste, in Val d’Isère, made its debut 57 years ago in 1966 and is named after ski legends Henri Oreiller and Jean-Claude Killy.

Oreiller-Killy (OK) Racecourse facts:

• Start Elevation: 2580m (Downhill) 2408m (Super-G)

• Finish Elevation: 1810 m

• Vertical Drop: 770m (Downhill) 598m (Super-G)

• Distance: 3037m (Downhill) 2035m (Super-G)

• Average slope: 32 %

• Max. slope: 52 %

• Min. slope: 12 %

Alpine Ski World Cup, World Championship, and Olympic Games. Only a few ski resorts can claim to have hosted all three, and the racecourses on which the events of the three competitions took place can be counted on the fingers of one hand.

Skiing first came to the isolated village of Val d’Isère in the 1930s. Years later, in 1948, Henri Oreiller became France’s first-ever Olympic ski gold medallist, securing Val d’Isère its place on the ski map of the world.

In 1955, race organiser Louis Erny and Charles Diebold, who was in charge of sport in Val d’Isère at the time, ran their first competition here. They hosted it in December, with the first competitions of the season not starting until January, they capitalized on the opportunity to introduce a new First Snow Critérium to round off the pre-season training courses, to be the first large meeting of the skiing season, and they named it the Critérium de la Première Neige. 55 skiers took part in the first edition of the race, mainly French, with Jean Bourdaleix being named the Critérium’s first winner and local skier, Firmin Mattis, taking the lead in slalom and combined.

The long-term objective of the event was to shine a worldwide spotlight on the resort and its challenging terrain, thus turning it into a top-level alpine skiing destination.

Initially, the races took place on the Solaise before the action switched in future years to the Bellevarde for both the men’s and women’s competitions.

Since 1968, when the Critérium de la Première Neige was officially recognised as part of the FIS World Cup, no less than 180 World Cup events have been contested on the slopes of the French resort. For the past 67 years, men and women racers have given their all on challenging slopes that have earned a legendary reputation. Every year, the resort hosts two spectacular weekends of skiing, and it comes as no surprise that Val d’Isère has organised more World Cup races than almost anywhere else in the world. A great many skiing champions have hailed from Val d’Isère, and its Club des Sports has trained some of the biggest names in skiing: Jean Claude Killy, Marielle and Christine Goitschel, Firmin Mattis, Patrice Bianchi, Ingrid Jacquemod, and Anémone Marmottan. Today, Val d’Isère Club des Sports, the most decorated sports club at the Winter Olympics, is proudly represented by Victor Muffat Jeandet and Clément Noël.

Val d'Isère is an international ski resort located in the Savoie, recognisable by its charming Chalet architecture. People come to Val d'Isere with precisely one purpose in mind: to Ski. Val d'Isere offers the skiers one of the most incredible Ski Paradises in the Alps: the Espace Killy, the Val d'Isere and Tignes combined skiing area, named in honour of Jean-Claude Killy, a magic skier, racing for Val d'Isere who won 3 gold medals in the 1968 Olympic Games. 300 kilometres of slopes are served by 89 modern lifts. A playground for every skier with two glaciers (Pissaillas Glacier in Val d'Isere and the Grande Motte in Tignes) and 154 runs as well as some magnificent and easily accessible off-piste opportunities.

Val d'Isère became a ski resort in 1934. At the time, one could only ski on the "Front de Neige" area as it would take a whole day and a pair of seal skins to reach the top of Solaise. The pioneer ski school was created two years later. The first cable car, Solaise, was inaugurated in 1942.

In 2021, Sofia Goggia made a double, winning the Downhill and the Super-G in Val d'Isère.

On December 18, 2021, Goggia confirmed her favorite role in Val d'Isère despite a couple of heart-stopping mistakes in the first section of the race. Goggia won each of the last seven women's World Cup Downhill events she participated in since a second-place finish in Val d'Isère on 18 December 2020. She broke her tie with Lindsey Vonn and Picabo Street for the longest women’s downhill win streak in the last 40 years. Only Austrian legend Annemarie Moser-Pröll had a longer streak with runs of eight and 11 wins in a row in the 1970s.

Breezy Johnson finished in second place, 0.27 seconds behind the Italian. Mirjam Puchner finished third, 0.91 seconds behind Goggia.

On December 19, 2021, Sofia Goggia crowned her race weekend in Val d'Isère with her second victory in a row. Ragnhild Mowinckel finished in second place, +0.33 seconds behind Goggia. The Norwegian was the only one able to break the dominance of the Italian team, with Elena Curtoni and Federica Brignone in third and fourth place.

In 2023, Downhill Gold medalist in Méribel Jasmine Flury won the second Downhill of the 2023-2024 winter season in Val d'Isère. Teammate Joana Hählen finished in second place, 0.22 seconds behind Flury. Cornelia Hütter rounded out the podium in third place, 0.24 seconds behind the Swiss skiers.

Federica Brignone won the second Super-G of the 2023-2024 winter season held on December 17th, in the Oreiller-Killy course at La Daille in Val d'Isère. The Italian set the best time in a challenging course to take the victory with a lead of 0.44 seconds over Kajsa Vickhoff Lie. Sofia Goggia rounded out the podium 0.59 seconds behind Brignone.