Intersections: Ski Racing and Photography; More Thoughts, Part 7
The visual attraction of ski racing extends beyond on-course displays of racers racing. There is much else to entertain or reward an observer, whether or not holding a camera.
There are the distant spectacles that surround the race hill.
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Closer in, early sun can crown the peaks above shadowed ski slopes that lead to the race arena.
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There are minor entertainments: a tree on a snowy race morning; a glaciated spring; B-net to protect errant racers; cloud layers half-obscuring the sun behind an unused lift; pre-race gusts that blast new snow from trees:
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Pre-race clusters of racers study the course, with or without a coach, trying to anticipate what to do and what will happen at race speeds.
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Every race is subject to atmospheric vagaries: dense snow flurries fall during a FIS slalom, wet flakes affect a parent's smartphone videos, snowy blasts of wind bend Super-G gates, rain drops and snow crystals, dislodged from slalom poles by racers, form a goggle-height drizzle.
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A spectator also has a chance to practice empathy. Not everything goes according to plan on course: straddling a giant slalom gate was certainly not part of his plan; nor is a scramble uphill to pass through a missed slalom gate; no-one is immune, even a very talented young U14, who makes a gorgeous turn and then straddles only two gates later and has to climb back, the chance of overall victory gone. And sometimes you aren't in a position to hike back uphill. These scenes illustrate the human side at its, well, most human.
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When things go wrong, as when a ski release when it arguably shouldn't, there may be on-hill commiseration by one coach and a binding adjustment by another.
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These two top U19 competitors, both having exited a slalom prematurely, sideslip down together while the race continues for everyone else.
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Comments
After a lifetime of mainly expressing myself with words, my postings here will mainly rely on images. They will speak for themselves to some extent, but I'll usually add a few comments of explanation. I've taken photographs for decades, since the 1950's, inspired in part by my father's photographic skill. Four years of photo assignments and quality darkroom time eventually gave way to decades of casual and family picture-taking. I re-immersed myself when I left film and turned to digital.