One of the USPs of Les Arcs for many years has been the Kilometre Lancéspeed skiing piste, on show every March and April below the Aiguille Rouge.
Speed skiing was briefly an Olympic sport
Les Arcs and Vars have traditionally been the two main French venues for this niche sport. But it's been a number of years since the piste at Arc 2000 has been used, leaving the way clear for Vars, venue for this year's Coupe de Monde. In the words of one ESF instructor I spoke to last month: "the resort has chosen to invest in other things - the ski de vitesse piste is just too expensive".
It still remains an important part of the resort's history - not least in the various posters you will see in local cafés and restaurants.
Les Arcs has not given up on being the host for competitions, however. The coming years are likely to see more serious slalom races following the investments at the Arc 1600 Cachette piste: more on that here.
Speed skiing is apparently the "sport of going downhill in a straight line as quickly as possible".
Vars and Les Arcs are the two remaining French courses
It certainly goes down as something of a niche sport, but does have a history going back to the 1930s. The French Wikipedia site gives a more detailed overview than its English language cousin. The first races were held in Switzerland, in Murren and St Mauritz, with the Austrian Leo Gasper achieving 137km/h in 1931.
During the 1970s the Italians appear to have been the keenest on the sport with the kilometro lanciato course in Cervina hosting an annual event. In the southern hemisphere a course was established at Portillo, and here Steve McKinney reached the 200km/h barrier in 1978.
Unsurprisingly, the big shadow hanging over the sport is safety. In 1978 two fatal accidents at Cervinia prompted the FIS to take speed skiing out of its portfolio altogether. Speed skiing races continued to be organised both in North America (Silverston), in Les Arcs and at La Clusaz. These events, coupled with improved security, prompted it to be included in the 1992 Albertville Olympics - the one and only time it has been included in the winter games. That event (which drew the second highest viewing figures of the games) saw the death of the Swiss skier Nicolas Bochatay during training. More recently, 2007 saw the death of British speed skier Caitlin Tover, who fell from the start area.
The courses at Les Arcs and Vars are still going. But Les Arcs is no longer marketing scaled-back versions of the course to holidaymakers. I think it is just being left to the people who really, really want to do it. I am told that there is only one ski maker still producing the 240 metre skis required to take part.
The Vars course has a 98% gradient at the start
Les Arcs does appear to be the Wembley of speed skiing, and both the male and female records were set there (251 km/h by Simon Origone and 242 km/h by Sanna Tidstrand). It starts at 2710m, below the Varet lift, and finishes, 1.7km later, at 2145 metres, at Arc 2000. You can watch it all unfold from the Chalets de l'Arc restaurant.
The top speeds can only be achieved be gliding on the thin watery layer above the melting snow, and so the records tend to have been set right at the end of the season. And, from 6 April, the piste will be back in action, during Les Arcs' speed week. This will see attempts at the world record on skis, monoski, handiski...and mountain bike. It's the brainchild of Eric Barone, who will be getting back on his bike with a view to breaking the 200 km/h barrier again....
This is the second category used by Alpes Magazine in their "Palmares des Stations" league table a couple of years ago.
I think the literal translation of "Extreme Glisse" is "Extreme Sliding", which falls a little short of what they mean.
What they are looking at is:
...stations which serve clients who are looking to discover a variety of things, with the emphasis on the technical....they place their accent on offering a range of different activities, for example off-piste, snowparks, boardercross...or indeed other activities away from the slopes like diving under the ice, parapente, ice climbing....
The categories they use to judge the winners are:
* Altitude
* Vertical drop
* No & variety of events
* Range of on-slope activities
* Range of off-slope activities
* Price of lift pass & accommodation
Alpe d'Huezwins its second award, offering the following delights: night skiing, telemark, snowpark, boardercross, helicopters, ski rando training, avalanche survival training and organised off-piste. It falls down on its lack of kite-skiing and scuba diving under the ice (if you like the latter, you can go to Tignes, Orcieres and Chamrousse).
The full league table is below. Some notable exceptions - for example La Plagne doesn't even make the long list!
1. Alpe d'Huez 2. Tignes 3. Chamonix
4. Les Arcs
5. Les 2 Alpes
6. Orcieres 1850
7. Saint-Gervais
8. Vars
9. Chamrousse
10. Val d'Isere
11. La Clusaz
12. Les Contamines
13. Val d'Allos
14. Les Menuires
15. Risoul
