Cortina's controversial Olympic sliding track to host test races without fans

CORTINA D’AMPEZZO, Italy — There won’t be any spectators for the opening test races at the controversial sliding venue for the Milan Cortina Winter Olympics.

That’s because while the track itself is mostly complete, the surrounding area remains a massive construction site.

Still, the upcoming World Cup bobsled and skeleton meet from Friday to Sunday will double as an Olympic test event.

Luge athletes have also been testing out the venue ahead of the Feb. 6-22 games.

“We’ll have had about 250 athletes test the track over the span of a month. So that’s a good stress test for the future,” said Fabio Saldini, the Italian government commissioner who has been overseeing the venue’s construction.

The old Eugenio Monti track first opened in 1923 then closed in 2008 because of rising maintenance costs.

The International Olympic Committee wanted sliding events for these games to be held on an existing track in nearby Austria (Igls) or Switzerland (St. Moritz) instead. And the IOC forced the local organizing committee to come up with a backup plan that entailed using the facility in Lake Placid, New York, if the Cortina track wasn’t ready on time.

Environmental considerations

While work tearing down the old track and building a new venue on the same site began with less than two years to go before the games, organizers are confident they will finish the $136 million project in time.

“The quality of the ice has been optimal. With the roof in place, and moveable shades that can be shifted, the sun never shines on the ice,” Saldini said, adding that natural grass will be planted on top of the roof to mitigate the impact on the environment.

Unlike the old track that used only ammonia, the new venue’s refrigerant is 96% glycol — which is much more climate-friendly — with ammonia used only in the compressors in the machine room to ensure cooling.

The track’s output will also be used to cool Cortina’s ice arena, which will host curling during the Olympics. And when the games are finished and the ice arena returns to being a hockey venue, a new curling center is slated to be built that also will be cooled by the sliding center’s facilities.

World Cup event

The test event is also the opening World Cup event of the Olympic season for the International Bobsleigh and Skeleton Federation.

It’s been almost 18 years since the last World Cup sliding event in Cortina was held in January 2008.

The new track is 100 meters longer than the old one (1,445 instead of 1,350 meters) and now features 16 corners instead of the previous 11.

Kaillie Humphries-Armbruster, the 40-year-old American bobsledder who has won three Olympic golds, is the only athlete in the 30-nation field who competed on the old Cortina track. She raced there for Canada in 2004, 2005 and 2008.

In skeleton, Cortina native Mattia Gaspari finally gets the chance to compete at home for host Italy.