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Artificial snow not up to date in spring

Zu At the beginning of this piece, a look at the temperature forecast is mandatory: Nine degrees Celsius can be read for Gelsenkirchen this Wednesday. Ascending trend. That doesn’t sound like a mulled wine and speculoos atmosphere between the years. If you look even further into the future, you can already feel the breath of spring on New Year’s Day, if the column in the thermometer should rise to 14 in the Ruhr area.

It would then be the opportunity for sports in shorts again. For those Europeans from the Global North who don’t feel like winter because they associate the season with snow and cold, now that we’re coming back to Gelsenkirchen, we’re tempted to see Schalke this Wednesday. Into the Stadion. There’s mulled wine, pastries, singing – and biathlon. When winter no longer comes to people, then make and get one, along with sport.

Biathlon spectacle at Schalke

It has been known for a few years how this works. In the “Alpenpark”, as the inventors call their indoor ski complex in Neuss at 40 meters above sea level, snow is produced and transported to Gelsenkirchen by truck. Until a 1.3 kilometer long white band is created on which biathlon celebrities circle, shoot in the arena and then run away incredibly fast before reappearing to the delight of 40,000 spectators.

A biathlon spectacle. The biggest, explains the organizer, that mankind has seen for 20 years now. Considering the 118-year history of their football club, Schalke fans will doubt whether, thanks to these two decades at Schalke, it is already part of the sporting tradition in this country, as claimed.

But with a bit of foresight, a PR expert discovers, it can’t be much longer, that a cultural asset is being preserved in this spectacle. If falling snowflakes from Mother Holle are one day as rare in these latitudes as elephants grazing freely, it could still be enough for (estimated) 100 truck trains – one way from Neuss 62 kilometers – with 2500 cubic meters of snow: so that the common German does not forget, what winter was like and how fast snow melts.

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