Exciting ski entry

Press, 13 June 1978, Page 30

Exciting ski entry

By

TIM DUNBAR

An exciting downhill racer, Erik Haker (Norway), is the first confirmed overseas entry for the international ski-ing series at Mount Hute next month. On the last World Cup cir- 1 cuit Haker finished ninth in, his specialist event, equal i with the Austrian, Werner: Grissmann, who won thel downhill bronze medal atj the world championships at ■ Grmisch-Partenkirchen last! January. Over all, he finished a| creditable eighteenth in World Cup standings, ahead of such well-known racers as Steve Mahre (United States), Gustavo Thoeni (Italy) and Bernhard Russi (Switzerland).

Australia has announced its intention to send between I 10 and 15 racers to Mount , Hutt and the team would be • likely to include top down- ■ hillers such as Dave Griff : (twenty-second in the 1976 Olympic downhill) and Rob--!bie Mclntyre to push Haker. II No downhill has been 11 raced at Mount Hutt since r the 1975 national and the ordganisers of the F.I.S. (Interim national Ski Federation) : series will be hoping for 11 better weather this year. I In 1977 the downhill was 11 supposed to be run at the i) start of the programme but 1 i this time it has been slotted ; in at the tail-end. The three j I days from July 23 to 25 i have been set down for i downhill training, with the ‘event itself on July 26.

The series starts on July 19 with the men’s slalom and the women’s slalom; the men’s giant slalom and the women’s giant slalom will be held on July 20, 21 and > 22 respectively. Recently, the plans of the organising committee received a boost with the that U.T.A. French Airlines would definitely take over the major sponsorship of the international series from Air New Zealand, which had dropped out this year. U.T.A. will be flying nine racers and a technical delegate from Europe to AustraI lia and then to Auckland. : After the races at Mount Hutt the overseas com- ■ petitors will be flown back ■ to Australia for the F.I.S. series there.