Didier Défago: "I think we're going to see a great spectacle on this piste."

What was the biggest challenge in building the piste and have there been any last-minute adjustments in the last few days?

You know, we are at high altitude, also a big part of the races are on the glacier and we cannot ski down on the desired line all the time. At the beginning it was a bit difficult for me, I did not know the terrain. But I think we did a good job together. The people from the local organisation and also the people from the mountain railroads were very important for me too They know the terrain very well. I would say every week, every week reverse of this creation was very important for me. We had to adapt some passages of the course. That also changed the character a bit, the philosophy and as well the vision of my first idea but I think we could keep a nice challenging race. We have now beautiful snow. We have winter conditions and we have to deal with that. But once again, I think we will have a nice spectacle on this slope.

The track has various exciting key sections. Which part do you personally like best?

I think the first one for me is the Matterhorn Jump, followed by the Sérac Traverse. You have a few seconds where we are a bit slower and you get the feeling that you are in the race. After the traverse it is going quickly into more action with a nice jump, we can go 60/70m sure, 60 metres without any problem and after you have the left turn. We have to keep this turn very nice because you need the speed direction Italy. This is the first key part for me. The second key part is the downhill passage “Muro Ventina” with some long turns with a lot of speed and this turn is also an exit of this passage, it’s very important too. For me, the three jumps, are the rock’n’roll part of the race because they are more in the air than on the ground and I hope that will also be attractive for the guys and also for the people, for the spectators.

Do coaches and athletes also come to you for advice about the piste?

Not really yet. Now I think everybody is focused on the race, on the training from today but some months ago and last year before the race, they asked a lot ‘’where do we go down? What will be for our race?’ ’I can give them some inputs; some feedbacks but it’s always difficult. If you have the environment, you have the design, you see also all the work with all the people, very hard work. You need that one skier goes down through the line before we can really say something about the course.

Why is the 1st training session important from your perspective?

It is important because if you have a training run, you can do the race. That’s the first important thing. The second thought is that maybe we can adjust something between the training and the race. Normally they do not do it, however here it is the first time that the race takes place so we could still adapt something. At the moment I do not know if there is a tricky passage or not. Normally, the training run is to show the potential of these races, of this course, of these mountains. We get a better feeling of the course because the guys are not 100% on their way on the first training but we can imagine what could be the race situation.