Chasing Olympic Medals Under the Lights

(ATR) The Sochi Olympics have seen more outdoor nighttime events than any Games previous.

Most skiers seem to embrace the nighttime setting for a variety of reasons.

"I like skiing under the lights, I think that most of the girls do because it keeps the visibility really consistent," said Mikaela Shiffrin, who won Friday’s slalom race by 0.53 seconds becoming the youngest Olympic slalom champion.

"The lights on this hill are really good."

Austrian bronze medalist Kathrin Zettel offered similar thoughts: "I always love night slaloms, it’s a nice feeling to ski in the night."

U.S. skier Resi Stiegler was one of 11 racers who failed to complete the nighttime second run, which began at 9 p.m.

"I think it’s really cool – kind of like a show environment, the afternoon run is a little awkward, but you’ll see how cool everything is with the second run," Stiegler said following her first run which began at 4:45 p.m. as the sun was beginning to set.

"When it gets darker the lights are better as well. I think it’s really awesome, like a showtime kind of thing," Stiegler said.

Canadian Marie-Michelle Gagnon had a vastly different reason for enjoying the night race.

"It just reminds me of back home when I’d go night skiing, and you would tuck the whole way down and have the ski patrol chase you," said Gagnon."It just brings back good memories with my family and friends when we would go night skiing after school."

Skiing under the lights is not entirely new for the ski racers at World Cup events. The men race in Schladming at night and the ladies do the same in Flachau. In 2006, the men’s and women’s Olympic slalom races in Torino were also contested at night.

International Ski Federation President Gian Franco Kasper likes the night format also, but for different reasons than the skiers.

"I think very commercially in this respect," Kasper told Around the Rings after Friday night’s race.

"If it’s good for our own television audience than we do it at night, because this time here is exceptional for Western Europe, let’s be honest. So that’s the reason we do it."

In addition to the men’s and women’s slalom races, eight of 20 freestyle skiing and snowboard events were also held at night at the nearby Rosa Khutor Extreme Park. The setting seems even more appropriate for these events with boisterous crowds taking their level of enthusiasm to a higher level.

"It’s just unreal tonight," said Australian snowboarder Kent Callister, during the men’s halfpipe, the first snowboard event staged under the lights on February 11.

"The crowd is roaring as you go down and its just such a thrill to be here and compete in this setting."

At the RusSki Gorki venue, all four ski jumping finals were held at night, while at the Laura Cross-Country Ski & Biathlon Center, all 11 biathlon finals occurred under the lights.

Over at the Sanki Sliding Center, all bobsleigh, luge and skeleton finals, except the closing four-man bobsleigh event on Sunday, were contested at night.

In total, 33 of 69 (47.8%) event finals at the five mountain cluster venues were staged at night under the lights.

"Every games I've been to we have actually raced in the evening," said U.S. luge bronze medalist Erin Hamlin, who is competing at her third Olympics.

" The second runs at least have always been at night. 
I don't mind, most places have great lighting and here it’s like daytime with the amount of lights in and around the track."

"At night, the fans don’t overheat walking the steep uphill," joked USA Luge communications director Sandy Caligiore, referring to the balmy daytime temperatures in Sochi.

Yiannis Exarchos, CEO of Olympic Broadcast Services for Sochi 2014, said that part of the reason for the numerous nighttime events was to satisfy rights-holding broadcasters worldwide.

"Sochi is placed quite uniquely geographically and in order to achieve quite attractive programming for broadcasters around the globe, the scheduling had to be dispersed across many more hours of the 24-hour day so we ended up with a lot of night events," Exarchos said.

"I actually think it is very nice for television but I also believe it was a very nice experience for the spectators. 



"It’s something that’s changing that I think we will start to see more in more in both summer and winter Olympic Games, regardless of where they will take place."

The alpine program at Rosa Khutor concludes on Saturday with the men’s slalom at night under the floodlights.

Written by Brian Pinelli

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