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Nordic centre progressing

But needs community support

Right now the Whistler Nordic Centre, site of the 2010 Nordic events – ski jumping, Nordic combined, cross-country, biathlon, Paralympic cross-country, Paralympic biathlon – is not much to look at. Some of the spaces required for buildings have been cleared, and a rough road to the site has been built. Most of the cross-country skiing trails have been flagged as well, with some brushing through the corridors.

There is no question that the facilities will be delivered to meet Olympic and Paralympic specifications, and will be delivered by 2007 to begin hosting test events, says John Aalberg, the Director of Nordic Sports for the Vancouver Organizing Committee (VANOC).

"We have the budget for it, it’s going to happen," he said.

But it takes more than a facility to host an Olympic and Paralympic Games and all of the events before and after the Games that VANOC has committed to. According to Aalberg you need people who know the sports to help as officials and volunteers, and you need strong local clubs to help develop and recruit those volunteers.

Aalberg spoke at the Whistler Nordic club’s annual general meeting on Saturday, Nov. 19, giving members an update on the current status of the Nordic centre and discussing ways the club can be more involved.

"My advice is to be part of this from beginning to the end, it’s something you will remember for the rest of your lives," he said. "What we can do now is to push it and do all we can to make sure it’s a great legacy for Whistler, Vancouver and the whole Nordic community."

Aalberg should know. As an athlete he competed in the 1992 and 1994 Olympic Winter Games. Norwegian by birth before becoming an American citizen, in 1997 he joined the Salt Lake Organizing Committee where he helped to design and develop the Soldier Hollow cross-country and biathlon venues, and directed all 2002 Nordic events. Part of the success of those events comes from the capacity that Aalberg developed within the local clubs, which continue to run the facility today.

He joined VANOC this past February, and in recent weeks has been meeting with Nordic clubs and provincial sport organizations to find out what their capacity is, and how they can work together to deliver test events and provide support for the Games. After the Games, those organizations will be responsible for ensuring that the facility becomes a working legacy through the Whistler Legacy Society, which "has not been created yet, but will be this winter," said Aalberg.

"In my experience I’ve found that it’s easy to deliver the Games, you have the money and your standards and the things have to get built," said Aalberg. "It’s much harder to create a legacy.

"We don’t have quite high enough numbers (in Nordic clubs) so we have to find people that will come to the Callaghan to help fund that facility. That will help us to push the legacy items and keep them in our budgets."

For the Nordic centre to become a legacy, Aalberg says, it will need to continue to host the public as well as high profile events like World Cup competitions. It should also function as a training centre for athletes.

"Any legacy money is tied to that. If we go ahead without racing programs, there will be no money (after the Games)," he said.

In the 2003-04 winter there were 110,000 skiers using facilities in the Lower Mainland and Whistler. About two million Canadians cross-country ski, and Cross-Country Canada has about 45,000 members. Clubs have to work to increase the level of participation, and the Whistler Nordic Centre has to be developed in such a way that it will attract those skiers, and bring new people to the sport.

Aalberg went through the same problems with Soldier’s Hollow. The answer was to create an umbrella community organization for all Nordic sports, and to build member groups to have the capacity to organize and volunteer for those events.

"Cross-country is fairly easy, there are trails everywhere across Canada. But how do we go about building community support for ski jumping or biathlon?" asked Aalberg. "The answer is that it’s hard, but you have to start somewhere."

That umbrella organization will help the Whistler Legacy Society decide what to do with the venues. The options are to lease them out as a concession, to manage the facilities themselves, or to partner with or sell to a private company.

Before the 2002 Games there were only a handful of organized cross-country skiers in the Salt Lake City area. Now the facility is managed by a functioning club. It has even become self-sustaining financially, with most of the funding coming from a tubing park created at the site. They had 60,000 visitors last season – 35,000 for the tubing park, and 25,000 for cross-country skiing.

A tubing park will not work in the Callghan, but Aalberg says there is potential for other activities, like snowshoeing and mountain biking. Hosting events and providing training facilities for Nordic teams are also important.

In the 250-hectare area provided for the Nordic centre, there will be space for three stadiums – one for cross-country, one for biathlon and one for ski jumping. Most of these stadiums will be temporary, but some permanent bleachers will be built near the main stadium building or daylodge.

There will also need to be additional buildings for teams, staff and the media that may or may not be temporary. There are no plans for any lodging, but according to Aalberg the Vancouver Nordic clubs would like to see a lodge or hostel at the site and were prepared to do some fundraising for such a facility.

The race courses themselves are incredibly compact, with 15 km of trails in an area of 800 metres by 1,200 metres. There are also plans to build training trails, and between 25 and 30 km of recreational trails, as well as ski jumps, a biathlon range, a Paralympic biathlon range and a paved loop for roller skiing in the summer months.

There are no plans for snowmaking, outside of the landing area for the ski jumps. The area generally gets more snow than Whistler and as of last weekend had about a metre of snow at the elevation of the Olympic facilities, which is between 800 and 900 metres. Even last year, with a warm, wet weather system in January almost ending the winter season for Whistler, the Nordic events could have been held in the Callaghan without any problems, says Aalberg.

The original Nordic centre plans had some of the facilities at a higher altitude but planners were forced to change the layout when Squamish First Nations pointed out that the course infringed on an area designated as a Wild Spirit Place.

The final design for the Callaghan should be completed by the end of 2005, with the exception of the additional recreational trails. With two summers for construction, everything should be in place for the fall of 2007. The first test event, a cross-country Nor Am event, will take place that December. A few months later the venue will host the national cross-country championships.

"That’s where we need to work together," said Aalberg. "How do we organize ourselves as a Nordic community to host these events? VANOC will have people in place the following year when we host the World Cup events, and they have a budget, and a volunteer program. We won’t have the same support for the test events in 2007-08…. That depends on grass roots, you guys (Whistler Nordics) and other clubs."

The trails will also open to the public in 2007, as soon as there is enough snow to start grooming. "For there to be a legacy there, we need to start using that legacy before the Games," Aalberg said.

According to Tom Barratt, the president of the Whistler Nordics, the presentation was an eye-opener. "We all knew what was coming, but it’s not as far off as it seems – 2010 is right around the corner, and we have all these test events before then. If we’re going to be a part of this, we have to act now."