Fire alarm in the team hotel. What a welcome. It’s a good thing that the German ski jumpers are already outside, where they play a bit of football tennis next to the parking lot to loosen up after arriving in Trondheim. Others like the Pole Kamil Stoch have to climb down 19 floors in the stairwell. “King Kamil”, as he is called in his homeland because of his many successes, knows that things are going downhill.
The Polish ski jumpers haven’t really gotten on track this season – and only a week and a half left and then it’s over again. However, before we go to Planica for the final ski flying, there is a lot of jumping and flying in Norway. RAW Air, the Scandinavians’ tour, is now making a stop in Trondheim after kicking off at Holmenkollen in Oslo.
Up to 300,000 will come next year.”
The artists of the air visit Central Norway. The date for the two days of ski jumping was well chosen. In one year, the Nordic World Ski Championships will take place at the Granasen sports center, a 15-minute drive southwest of Trondheim. The meeting of the best ski jumpers, cross-country skiers and combined skiers. Age Skinstad is the CEO, the boss of the World Cup. Together with his team, he cleaned up the sports facilities south of Trondheim.
Almost everything is new. The Norwegians spent around 100 million euros to make the two ski jumps, the jumping stadium, the functional buildings and the cross-country ski trail network suitable for the World Cup. A new biathlon shooting range has also been built. Skinstad is proud that the topic of sustainability plays a special role. Electricity is generated at night by the power of water, of which Norwegians have a particularly large amount. There is also usually plenty of snow.
But rains in recent weeks have caused a lot of melting in Granasen. “Something else is coming at Easter,” predicts the 59-year-old Norwegian, who used to be an excellent cross-country skier himself and who held a variety of leadership positions in Norwegian sport. He takes time for an extensive viewing appointment and is certain: “Up to 300,000 spectators will come next year.” 220,000 tickets are to be sold for the winter highlight from February 26th to March 9th. “And you know: Then there are the 80,000 who are in the forest.”
The ambitions are great. To ensure that all plans come to fruition, they have already created a huge snow depot in front of the entrance to the compact ski center. 40,000 cubic meters of white splendor for all occasions. 22,000 spectators fit into the cross-country skiing stadium. There is space for 18,000 visitors in the stands for ski jumping right next door in this sports area with particularly short distances.
“I’m very happy, it was fun”
In these days, when the RAW Air continues to jump and are sorted out when looking at the overall standings, everything is still very manageable. The temporary press center is within sight of the two new ski jumps – and is particularly curious. It is housed in the Granasen kindergarten, where 65 very young Norwegians have no idea what it means to race down a ski jump.
