Powder moves afoot

Press, 6 August 1987, Page 38

Powder moves afoot

Moves are afoot to run a future world powder eights ski-ing championship in the remote Harris Mountains range, near Wanaka. The world powder eights are usually held in the Cari-boos-Bugaboos helicopter skiing area of Canada, but New Zealand has been attracting top powder skiers to its own contest in the Harris Mountains — the Salomon powder eights — for some years. "The competition is as good if not better than the world championships,” said Werner Hanni, president of the New Zealand Ski Industries Federation.

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isers,” Hanni said.

Hanni and Wolfgang Kiehne combined to retain their national powder crown last week and they will again represent New Zealand in the world powder eights in April, 1988. Amid some controversy they were placed fourth in the 1987 event at Blue River. Paul Scaife, the managing director of Harris Mountains Heli Ski-ing, intends to talk to Mike Wiegele, of Canada, about the possibility of running a world championship in the near future. At present Wiegele apparently has sole rights to the contest.

Hanni likes the idea ofhaving the world championships in New Zealand. "It would be rather nice if it could alternate between here and Canada,” said the Christchurch man.

The former Swiss B team member and Canterbury team coach believes that the Wanaka event is better run than the one in Canada.

“In Canada the difficulty is that the organisers are the judges. Here we have totally independent judges who have nothing to do with the organ-

VIEWS FROM THE TOP

Tim Dunbar

This year the competitors in the Salomon powder eights were judged by three New Zealand Ski Instructors' Alliance examiners, headed by the Mount Hutt ski school director, Tony Graham. Among the skiers who tackled the powder snow in the Harris Mountains (specifically from Goldrush Peak this year) were several Americans, Germans, a Swiss and a Swede. “There were heaps of nationalities,” Hanni said.

Already looking ahead to the 1988 world powder eights at Blue River, Hanni and Kiehne are aiming to be in the first three. Last time some observers believed either the New Zealanders (fourth) or the German team (fifth) should have won the title.

No powder masks ... One of the more remarkable facts to emerge from last week’s Salomon powdereights was that all the competitors kept on their feet. It was the first time in the six-year history of the event that nobody fell during the judged runs. That was quite an accomplishment considering each of the 16 teams — making figure-eight tracks in powder snow — skied

two’ judged runs of about 1000 vertical feet each. The five pairs in the final had an extra “sudden death” run.

Bruising encounter Basketball is not one of the favourite sports of the Mount Hutt ski school director, Tony Graham, right now. Several of his instructors played a bruising game at Methven High School a couple of weeks ago, which left three walking wounded. One instructor dislocated a knee, another had a front tooth broken which required a $6OO repair job, and another got an elbow in the eye. “Basketball is definitely a dirty word in the ski school,” Graham said. He blames the influence of his American instructors who, he said, treated basketball "like our rugby.” The halfsize court probably did not help matters. Pampered skiers

Air New Zealand has its Koro club, Ansett its Golden Wing. Now the Mount Cook Group intends to open its own version of an executive club lounge at the Coronet Peak ski area, Queenstown. The Executive Club, to be located in the rebuilt base facilities building on the ski-field, is designed for an up-market clientele. Skiers will be offered use of the Coronet

Peak V.I.P. room, complimentary bar facilities, a gourmet luncheon, all day instruction and use of the V.I.P. carpark, among other things. All for a largish daily fee of $2OO a person for groups of four or $250 a person for two. King of speed

Graham Wilkie was more or less just another British speed skier when he came down to New Zealand last winter for the F.I.S.V. world series race at Turoa. He will return next month as someone different altogether — the fastest man on skis in the world. Wilkie set a startling new mark of 212.514km/h at Les Arcs, France, in April. The record is in dispute because it was not set on a homologated course, but it is “recognised by most racers,” according to Martin Jones, secretary of the New Zealand Speed Skiers. Wilkie and his brother, Stuart, have already confirmed they are coming back for the South Pacific Grand Prix event at Turoa in mid-September and will be picking up camper-vans in Auckland. Also confirmed is C. J. (“Crazy John”) Mueller from Breckenridge, Colorado, the winner of the 1986 Turoa event and now the secondfastest skier in the world. He held the world record for about 15min at Les Arcs until Graham Wilkie came down the speed track again. Several other top international speed skiers are expected to be in Turoa preparing for another world record attempt at Portillo, Chile, from September 26 to October 4. However, Jones said the international race at Turoa was still subject to snow groomers being allowed in the national park.