Besides the Technical Committees for the six Olympic disciplines, numerous other FIS Committees and working groups also gathered during the FIS Autumn Meetings in Zurich.

The Committee for Advertising Matters reviewed the designs of the new advertising installations for the title sponsor Audi to be used during the coming season in the FIS Alpine Ski World Cup. Furthermore, it held a long discussion on the guiding principles for the FIS Advertising Rules which will be fundamentally revised beginning with the Committee's meeting at the 2010 Congress.

The Medical Committee spent significant effort on reviewing the detailed findings of the FIS Injury Surveillance System (ISS) that has been in place for three seasons and is generously supported by dj Orthopaedics. The data demonstrate a stable but relatively high level of injuries especially in Alpine and Freestyle Skiing and Snowboarding. On the invitation of the Medical Committee an expert group on Safety Equipment also held its first meeting in Zurich with the goal of providing additional professional insight into determining the next steps for the FIS ISS and towards permanently reducing the number of serious injuries to top level athletes.

The Speed Skiing Committee focused on automating its results reporting processes with the help of a free results submission program to be provided by the FIS IT department. This will also help improve the quality of the FIS points reporting and support the further development of the Speed Skiing downhill event which will help the sport grow, In addition, the Speed Skiing Committee will seek approval from FIS Council for holding the 2011 World Speed Ski Championships in Verbier-Nendaz (SUI) in place of Hundfjallet (SWE).

While the Grass Skiing Committee mostly devoted its meetings to analyzing the season that just concluded, the Telemark Committee was focused on finalizing the plan for the coming season, including reviewing the test results of a new timing and data software developed by the Norwegian Ski Association.

Meanwhile, the Coordination Group and four Sub-Committees for Youth and Children's Questions spent time reviewing feedback from the 7th annual FIS Youth and Children's Seminar held at the start of the meetings week, as well as looking ahead to further development plans, especially the events in the FIS disciplines, for the first edition of Winter Youth Olympic Games Innsbruck in 2012.

Well-attended Youth Seminar opens Autumn Meetings

24/09/2009. The beginning of the meetings week was again presented by the 7th FIS Youth and Children's Seminar, held.on Wednesday 23rd September. 70 participants representing 40 nations had a busy day discussing various ways of financing youth sports through partnerships and ways of making sure that youngsters stay with the sport through to adulthood. External speakers included representatives of partner companies such as soft drink Rivella and ski manufacturer Stöckli, as well as of the ski schools, ski lift companies and governmental organizations.

Ken Read, Chairman of the Youth and Children's Coordination Group, summarized the seminar discussions: " We have seen today that there are many good ideas and we will find ways of implementation in the different nations." He added: "Today's seminar has shown that it is not only to bring the children to the snow but to find the right measures to keep them there. This seminar enabled the participants to exchange their many ideas in this area and we will be building on this dialogue in the future."

FIS hosts symposium on development of Alpine ski sport

30/09/2009. At the conclusion of the FIS Committee Meetings week on Saturday 26th September, FIS hosted a Symposium on the Development of Alpine Ski Sport. The focus of the first-time symposium was on costs and measures to help streamline the expense of organizing the sport. The request for such an open forum came from the ski industry following a tough season which led them to take some extreme measures not only in regard to their commitment to ski racing, but many other areas of their business too. The symposium comprised presentations from representatives of the ski industry, National Ski Associations, World Cup organizing committees and FIS during the first part of the program, principally to recap on the financial situation and commitment from the respective parties. Afterwards, an open discussion too place among the more than 80 participants representing the above groups as well as FIS Alpine Committee members, television and marketing rights holders.

FIS President Gian Franco Kasper summarized the session: "The symposium featured many interesting and intense discussions on important topics impacting all the stakeholders. The key issues were put on the table in a sober fashion. At the same time, there was no solution to the main challenge of cost-cutting as no party was able to provide concrete and actionable ideas. FIS will now endeavor a more detailed analysis in order to provide some suggestions to act upon."

Snowboard: Toward the Games

04/10/2009. The Zürich meetings in the different working groups under the FIS Snowboard Committees had the Olympic Winter Games as a main theme. While the preparations for the 2010 Games in Vancouver are entering their final stage, the organizers of the 2014 Games in Sochi still have more time. Even so, an inspection of the planned Sochi venue is scheduled for early November .

In terms of rules and calendar planning, there were some rules changes to enable one run qualifications and finals in half-pipe and small amendments to the World Cup calendars in the 2010/2011 and 2011/2012 seasons.

The Snowboard Committee has submitted a proposal to the Council for its consideration to present to the 2010 FIS Congress to add slopestyle as a World Championship event in the FIS Snowboard World Championships and in the Junior World Snowboard Championships starting with the 2010 edition in New Zealand in August 2010.

The Sub-Committee for Snowboard and Freestyle Youth and Children's Questions also met to discuss its strategy and will be working on an organizational analysis and determining its goals and strategy to implement under a new chairman to be appointed by the Council at its next Meeting.

Freestyle: Olympic focus

04/10/2009. The upcoming Olympic Winter Games Vancouver 2010 were one of the major focus areas for the FIS Freestyle Committee meetings in Zurich. In practice, this included work to tidy up the rules and make final refinements especially for ski cross which will make its Olympic debut in some 135 days. Specifically a new measurement tool for ski cross uniform testing was evaluated and accepted. Moreover, FIS Freestyle is working hard with the Olympic Broadcasting Services (OBS) to prepare and deliver a live helmet cam solution for the Olympic ski cross competitions.

Other main topics included the development and evaluation of potential future events, such as Freestyle slopestyle and big air which are highly popular among the younger generations. The coming months will see the Committee Members working to conduct a detailed assessment of the current situation and begin development of the discipline's ten-year strategic plan called Freestyle '2020 Vision' which will be presented for discussion during the FIS Congress 2010 in Antalya.

Alpine Skiing: Nations Team Event as parallel race

04/10/2009. At the core of the discussion for the FIS Alpine Committee, its Executive Board and the various Sub-Committees was the format of the Nations Team Event at the 2010 FIS Alpine World Cup finals and the rules for the qualification races in the technical events at the FIS Alpine World Ski Championships.

Based on a detailed analysis conducted Nations Team Event Working Group led by Vedran Pavlek (CRO), including a survey of six groups of stakeholders and an evaluation of TV viewer figures from all past editions of the event, the Alpine Committee decided to propose a one-time test of a team parallel race format for the NTE during the 2010 Audi FIS Alpine Ski World Cup Finals in Garmisch-Partenkirchen (GER). The Council will also deliberate on new rules for the World Championship technical event qualification races which would allow up to 100 competitors to participate in the final; besides the 50 racers who qualify directly and the top 25 racers in the qualification race, additional 25 nations not represented among the first 75 racers could nominate one competitor for the final.

In addition there were some minor adjustments to the calendars and updated to the rules such as specifications for the one-pole slalom now in use in races below the FIS level.

Nordic Combined: More testing

04/10/2009. The Nordic Combined Committee's focus in Zurich was on analyzing the experiences of the Summer Grand Prix competitions. Similar to Ski Jumping, the pilot of the new rules in the jumping part of Nordic Combined is planned to continue during the 09/10 season. During the Olympic Winter Games, the old rules in use during the previous 2008/09 season would still be applied.

Further analysis will still be conducted to decide whether inline skates or roller skis will be used during the 2010 Summer Grand Prix. A final decision will be made during the 2010 Congress in Antalya (TUR) where the competition calendar, too, will be finalized.

Ski Jumping: Pilot continues

04/10/2009. The dominating topic at the meeting of the Ski Jumping Committee was the new competition rules tested during the FIS Summer Grand Prix that take into account the current wind conditions and allow a change of the inrun length during a competition.

The new rules seek to ensure fairness for all competitors and to enable smooth staging of competitions also in difficult conditions by permitting a change of starting platform during a competition round. The impact of the wind and inrun length changes is integrated into the total point score based on a mathematical formula that is adapted for every hill.

In Zürich, the Ski Jumping Committee decided to recommend to the Council to continue the test during the winter season in a somewhat modified form. The test would include the entire competition season 2009/2010, with the exception of the Olympic Winter Games Vancouver 2010, where the rules valid for the previous 2008/2009 season will be in use.

Adaptations supported by the Jumping Committee include a key change regarding the inrun length, along with other smaller amendments. By contrast to the pilot, the inrun length can only be changed by the competition jury. During the summer, the national team coaches also had the chance to reduce the length of the inrun for their athletes.

Walter Hofer, FIS Head of Ski Jumping and Nordic Combined commented: "In my view, the new rules received surprisingly positive feedback. However, we will continue the trial phase, test the details and especially the impact of the new regulation that only the jury may change the inrun length.

Contributed by Horst Nilgen

Cross-Country Skiing: Emphasis on calendar frames and marketing

04/10/2009. During the FIS Autumn Meetings in Zürich, the FIS Cross-Country Committee and its various Sub-Committees held several meetings to discuss and develop the sport further. In addition, a seminar for the World Cup organizers, a meeting of the Tour de Ski organizers, a World Cup Technical Delegate update and a Cross-Country TV Seminar were held.

The Committee meetings were mostly occupied with the overall frames of the competition calendar for the next several years with the main principles to be followed being continuity and maintaining and developing the necessary experience. New organizers from Poland and Italy presented their plans for new World Cup sites for consideration next spring. An update about the procedure of the new multi-stage World Championships was also provided and will be presented to the Council for its' consideration to submit to the 2010 Congress. All bodies were also informed about the progress with the Cross-Country marketing project which is in full swing getting ready for the season. The new Cross-Country website will be launched in mid-November.

Contributed by Sandra Spitz

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