The Stelvio course is well known as one of the most demanding downhills in the world.
It's an incredible and often very icy run with 1000m of vertical drop and a course length close to 3000m, raced in 120 seconds.
An Austrian has won 11 of the 18 downhill events on this course. USA has won 3, France 2, Norway and Italy each once. The Swiss are still at zero wins, even if they dominated the World Championships in 1985 with Pirmin Zurbriggen.
The first and only Italian victory took place last year (2009) thanks to Christof Innerhofer.
Among the winners nobody has been able to win more than twice in DH: Daron Rahlves, Luc Alphand, Hannes Trinkl, Hermann Maier and Michael Walchhofer are in this exclusive club.
In 1998 Hermann Maier won by 0.70 in front of Fritz Strobl, while Michael Walchhofer avoided the first Swiss victory winning by 0.01 in front of Didier Cuche in 2006!
Further improvements for safety
A recent addition of 100m of A safety net increased the safety of the course another step. The new net has been placed to the right side of Pian dell'Orso, just under the chairlift Fontana Longa - Valbella.
Altogether, 3km of A nets, 16km of B nets, 6km of C and more than 70 air fences will aid the safety level on the 3000 m of the Stelvio course.
Two helicopters will guarantee, as usual, the maximum in case of emergency with very fast transportation to the hospital of Sondalo or Sondrio.
Tillbaka på Rivieran
Kom tillbaka till Monaco runt lunch igår. Är F1 till helgen och det väntas komma ner mycket bekanta ansikten så kommer nog bli en riktigt rolig helg. Fram tills dess ska jag...
22 May 2013
