Alpine skiing World Cup proposes schedule changes due to climate change

By OlympicTalkMay 5, 2023, 4:51 PM EDT

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Due to climate change, Alpine skiing World Cup organizers proposed pushing the start of next season back one week, as well as the World Cup Finals, and also scheduling the first speed races later into the fall.

A meeting was held Friday to outline the 2023-24 World Cup schedule with proposals made that are subject to approval at an International Ski Federation council meeting on May 24.

Climate change has become an increasing topic of discussion, especially after several early season races last fall were postponed due to weather. The season usually starts in late October with men’s and women’s giant slaloms in Soelden, Austria.

Last season, the first speed races that were to take place, for the first time, amid the backdrop of the Matterhorn were canceled due to lack of snow. Those were scheduled for the last weekend of October (men) and first weekend of November (women).

A proposal announced Friday has those races being scheduled for later in November next season.

Also proposed: changing the one-week format of the season-ending World Cup Finals, traditionally in mid-to-late March, to cover two weekends. The first weekend would be technical races of slalom and giant slalom. The second weekend would be the speed races of downhill and super-G.

With no world championships in even years, the World Cup Finals in Saalbach, Austria, will be the most prestigious competition of next season.

As previously reported, the women’s World Cup schedule proposal includes dropping the traditional December speed races in Lake Louise, Alberta. They would be replaced by races in Mont Tremblant, Quebec. Friday’s press release did not mention the fate of men’s speed races in Lake Louise.

Lake Louise held at least one Alpine World Cup race every year from 1993 through this past season, save 2020-21 when the tour did not visit North America due to the coronavirus pandemic.

In 2018, the resort announced that its downhill run would be renamed “Lake Lindsey Way” after Lindsey Vonn, who earned 18 of her 82 World Cup wins at Lake Louise in 44 career starts there.

Vonn was so successful there that, in the middle of her career, the venue started unofficially being called Lake Lindsey.

Mikaela Shiffrin and Bode Miller earned their first World Cup downhill and super-G victories at Lake Louise. Picabo Street‘s first World Cup downhill win also came there.

A team combined event, where a nation uses a different skier for the speed run and slalom run, is also proposed to debut for men and women.

The combined, which has been an individual event on the Olympic program since 1988, has not been held on the World Cup in the last three seasons. More parallel events have been phased in instead.

The IOC said last June that the combined was being provisionally included on the 2026 Olympic program, subject to further review with a final decision expected this spring. The team parallel event that was on the Olympic program in 2018 and 2022 has been dropped for 2026.

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At the French Open, a Ukrainian mom makes her comeback

By OlympicTalkMay 31, 2023, 7:12 AM EDT

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Ukraine’s Elina Svitolina, once the world’s third-ranked tennis player, is into the French Open third round in her first major tournament since childbirth.

Svitolina, 28, swept 2022 French Open semifinalist Martina Trevisan of Italy, then beat Australian qualifier Storm Hunter 2-6, 6-3, 6-1 to reach the last 32 at Roland Garros. France’s top player, fifth seed Caroline Garcia, or 56th-ranked Russian Anna Blinkova is next.

Her husband, French player Gael Monfils, finished his first-round five-set win after midnight on Tuesday night/Wednesday morning. Svitolina watched that match on a computer before going to sleep ahead of her 11 a.m. start Wednesday.

“This morning, he told me, ‘I’m coming to your match, so make it worth it,'” she joked on Tennis Channel. “I was like, OK, no pressure.

“I don’t know what he’s doing here now. He should be resting.”

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Svitolina made at least one major quarterfinal every year from 2017 through 2021, including the semifinals at Wimbledon and the U.S. Open in 2019. She married Monfils one week before the Tokyo Olympics, then won a singles bronze medal.

Svitolina played her last match before maternity leave on March 24, 2022, one month after Russia invaded her country. She gave birth to daughter Skai on Oct. 15.

Svitolina returned to competition in April. Last week, she won the tournament preceding the French Open, sweeping Blinkova to improve to 17-3 in her career in finals. She’s playing on a protected ranking of 27th after her year absence and, now, on a seven-match win streak.

“It was always in my head the plan to come back, but I didn’t put any pressure on myself, because obviously with the war going on, with the pregnancy, you never know how complicated it will go,” she said. “I’m as strong as I was before, maybe even stronger, because I feel that I can handle the work that I do off the court, and match by match I’m getting better. Also mentally, because mental can influence your physicality, as well.”

Svitolina said she’s motivated by goals to attain before she retires from the sport and to help Ukraine, such as donating her prize money from last week’s title in Strasbourg.

“These moments bring joy to people of Ukraine, to the kids as well, the kids who loved to play tennis before the war, and now maybe they don’t have the opportunity,” she said. “But these moments that can motivate them to look on the bright side and see these good moments and enjoy themselves as much as they can in this horrible situation.”

Svitolina said that she’s noticed “a lot of rubbish” concerning how tennis is reacting to the war.

“We have to focus on what the main point of what is going on,” she said. “Ukrainian people need help and need support. We are focusing on so many things like empty words, empty things that are not helping the situation, not helping anything.

“I want to invite everyone to focus on helping Ukrainians. That’s the main point of this, to help kids, to help women who lost their husbands because they are at the war, and they are fighting for Ukraine.

“You can donate. Couple of dollars might help and save lives. Or donate your time to something to help people.”

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Marcell Jacobs still sidelined, misses another race with Fred Kerley

By OlympicTalkMay 31, 2023, 7:07 AM EDT

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Olympic 100m champion Marcell Jacobs of Italy will miss another scheduled clash with world 100m champion Fred Kerley, withdrawing from Friday’s Diamond League meet in Florence.

Jacobs, 28, has not recovered from the nerve pain that forced him out of last Sunday’s Diamond League meet in Rabat, Morocco, according to Italy’s track and field federation.

In his absence, Kerley’s top competition will be fellow American Trayvon Bromell, the world bronze medalist, and Kenyan Ferdinand Omanyala, the world’s fastest man this year at 9.84 seconds. Kerley beat both of them in Rabat.

The Florence Diamond League airs live on Peacock on Friday from 2-4 p.m. ET.

Jacobs has withdrawn from six scheduled head-to-heads with Kerley dating to May 2022 due to a series of health issues since that surprise gold in Tokyo.

Kerley, primarily a 400m sprinter until the Tokyo Olympic year, became the world’s fastest man in Jacobs’ absence. He ran a personal best 9.76 seconds, the world’s best time of 2022, at last June’s USA Track and Field Outdoor Championships. Then he led a U.S. sweep of the medals at July’s worlds.

Jacobs’ next scheduled race is a 100m at the Paris Diamond League on June 9. Kerley is not in that field, but world 200m champion Noah Lyles is.

The last time the reigning Olympic and world men’s 100m champions met in a 100m was the 2012 London Olympic final between Usain Bolt and Yohan Blake. From 2013 to 2017, Bolt held both titles, then retired in 2017 while remaining reigning Olympic champion until Jacobs’ win in Tokyo, where Kerley took silver.

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