Swiss have an advantage?: Austrians complain about lack of training in Zermatt

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The Ski World Cup is looking forward to the premiere of the downhill event in Zermatt. The first training is on Wednesday, followed by the men’s races on Saturday and Sunday. The course is unknown to almost all drivers.

No country could really train on the Gran Becca – except the Swiss. And so the Austrians are already doing everything they can to shift the role of favorites to the Swiss team.

“The Swiss have a home advantage, they have trained a lot. That doesn’t have to mean anything, but normally the Swiss should take places one to six,” says ÖSV head coach Marko Pfeifer (49). The window for his stars in the week before Sölden fell victim to the bad weather. “We only had this time available.”

Vincent Kriechmayr (32) also says: “They will certainly be the favorites, but that is not the reason why we are giving up. If you’re at the start, it doesn’t matter.” It is also clear to the Ösi star that they would not have given other countries more opportunities to drive.

The Swiss hardly got on the track

But the benefit isn’t as bad as it sounds. In the upper part of the course, only the Swiss European Cup riders were able to train more intensively. However, the World Cup squad around Marco Odermatt (26), Niels Hintermann (28) and Stefan Rogentin (29) was in training camp abroad during this time.

The established stars only jumped the Matterhorn once. However, without having driven the Traverse afterwards. So it’s not all that bad.

Fundamental Swiss advantage

What is certain: the Swiss generally have an advantage thanks to the two glacier training slopes in Zermatt and Saas-Fee USA. Apart from these two options, there are no glacier descents to practice on in Europe.

So the Swiss stars could certainly train more downhill than anyone else – but not on the new route in Zermatt.

Ösis already complained in 2021

By the way: In 2021 the Austrians complained because before the World Cup in Cortina (Italian) only the Italo team around Dominik Paris (34) was allowed to train on the new downhill. Who ultimately became world champion downhill and super-G? The Austrian Vincent Kriechmayr.

Source : Blick