First tests a success: the lugers, bobsleigh and skeleton racers were able to use the new Olympic track in Cortina d'Ampezzo for the first time
Image: Keystone
After a successful World Cup winter, Switzerland's Natalie Maag was one of the first testers
Image: Keystone
There was a long debate as to whether a new ice track should be built in the traditional winter sports resort of Cortina
Image: Keystone
Work is still in full swing for the Olympic Games in just under a year's time
Image: Keystone
The ice track is named after Eugenio Monti, one of the most successful bobsleigh racers in history. The Italian, who grew up in Cortina, won two silver medals at home in 1956 and two Olympic gold medals twelve years later in Grenoble
Image: Keystone
First tests a success: the lugers, bobsleigh and skeleton racers were able to use the new Olympic track in Cortina d'Ampezzo for the first time
Image: Keystone
After a successful World Cup winter, Switzerland's Natalie Maag was one of the first testers
Image: Keystone
There was a long debate as to whether a new ice track should be built in the traditional winter sports resort of Cortina
Image: Keystone
Work is still in full swing for the Olympic Games in just under a year's time
Image: Keystone
The ice track is named after Eugenio Monti, one of the most successful bobsleigh racers in history. The Italian, who grew up in Cortina, won two silver medals at home in 1956 and two Olympic gold medals twelve years later in Grenoble
Image: Keystone
What hardly anyone would have thought possible: last week, the new Olympic track in Cortina was used for the first time. Luge athlete Natalie Maag was one of the first. "It was mega cool," she says.
31.03.2025, 13:25
31.03.2025, 13:29
SDA
Just three weeks ago, when Natalie Maag was lying on a beach in Thailand after the last World Cup and an Italian luge colleague showed her pictures from Cortina d'Ampezzo, she was sure that there was no way she would be able to race on next year's Olympic track in March. And yet there she was last Tuesday with her sled.
Maag was one of the privileged (or daring) lugers, bobsleigh and skeleton racers who were the first to plunge into the world's newest ice track - just like four years ago in Yanqing for the Beijing Games. But the difference could hardly be greater. In China, everything was completely finished for the first runs a year before the Games, whereas in Cortina the athletes encountered a huge construction site. The first runs were always from far below, for the lugers from the junior start. "But you couldn't have done the first five turns either, the ice wasn't ready yet," Maag told Keystone-SDA.
A small, expensive miracle
The fact that the track in Cortina is there at all is nothing short of a miracle. The IOC had spoken out against the construction of a new ice channel after the one used for the 2006 Games in Turin was no longer in use after just a few years and had become a ruin. However, the right-wing nationalist government in Rome did not want competitions abroad under any circumstances - and for the first time in the history of the Olympic Games - and pushed through the project for a new track in Cortina. In record time, a new ice track was constructed in ten months at a cost of over 100 million euros.
"Apart from the track, nothing is finished yet," says Maag with a laugh. She had to climb a small ladder to get to the start, the sledges were lifted up with a crane and the coaches made makeshift platforms so that they could see and film the athletes' runs. Nevertheless, the 27-year-old from the Zurich Oberland region is happy and grateful that she can race in Cortina and that Plan B - the Olympic race in Lake Placid, USA - is not the only option. "This is extremely important. Races overseas would have been the beginning of the end for the ice channel sports at the Olympics," Maag is convinced.
Encouraging improvements
Each day, the athletes were able to start from higher up, with Maag completing a total of nine runs along the entire length. Every evening, the riders exchanged ideas in meetings with each other, the officials of the associations and the track operators. Feedback is important in order to be able to make improvements to the track. Maag, who finished fifth overall in the World Cup last season (two places), expects to improve her times by around five seconds in a year's time. For comparison: in Yanqing, the difference between the first runs and the current track record is three tenths of a second.
"The track has a nice rhythm. It's certainly easy to ride," says the only Swiss luger in the World Cup. "The question is simply how it will ride when we're even faster." Turn 4 is still the biggest cause for concern. "It's mega badly built in the entry area. You can't really get up into the bend." Everyone is of the same opinion, including the bobsleigh and skeleton athletes. It was written in the minutes that "something needs to be changed to the concrete lining at the start of turn four and more ice is needed at the exit". The problem: "The Italians always say 'yes, it is rideable' and are probably also hoping for an advantage for their riders," believes Maag.
Medal in focus
Either way, she speaks of a "very cool week". The interaction between them was much closer than usual and they also played cards together every evening. A training week is planned for everyone in October and a test event in November. As some things are still changing, Maag does not expect her invitation to the pre-homologation to give her a big advantage, as she did in Beijing. Nevertheless, she firmly believes in her ultimate goal of winning a medal.
Until then, she and the track operators still have a lot of work ahead of them. However, everyone is pleased that it is now definitely possible to race in Cortina.
