Les Rousses World Cup stage cancelled – organisers admit it could have been held, but …too much trouble. And who are we to blame them?

The Les Rousses World Cup scheduled for January 14 to 16 is canceled

It’s the first time in the ” Covid era” when the major event is not cancelled on the direct order from local health authorities – but because, you know, things don’t quite add up, the troubles outweigh the gains. The organizers of would-be Les Rousses stage are quite blunt:

“…The presence of spectators would entail the implementation of substantial technical and human resources to ensure the health security …In addition to the concern for the health of the teams on the eve of an event not to be missed, Jura Ski Events also fears the financial consequences…”

It’s not a secret that financials of the most FIS World Cup stages were iffy even in those blessed pre-Covid times. With all the extra ” hygienic concept and safe distance ” costs the things are rapidly going from bad to worse. Or even impossible. Nobody want to be debt after staging the event.

The FIS World Cup stages in 2020 are still being organised as , essentially, local club invitation events, backed by national federations. Ski clubs are not exactly golf clubs with 100k/ year memberships and are not really structured to think of business side of things i.e. how to increase profits by all means legal. Not that it would be easy to change established mentality of all stakeholders in xcskiing.

Meanwhile, the IBU World Cup events are chugging along – robust financial health of the sport based on its ability to sell television rights allows it keep on staging the events whenever and however planned – unless directly ordered to stop, like happened in Norway in early 2021.