The forces fighting for the advancement of women's ski jumping won a new victory last week, when the International Ski Federation (FIS) voted to create a World Cup circuit for airborne female athletes beginning in the 2011-2012 season.
"This is a major step forward for women's ski jumping," Deedee Corradini, president of Women's Ski Jumping USA, said in a statement last Wednesday (June 9).
"One of the reasons the International Olympic Committee has used in the past to justify not allowing the women into Vancouver 2010 is that the women didn't have a World Cup to date.
"Having a World Cup in 2011-2012 and our second world championship in 2011 opens the door wide for our inclusion in Sochi 2014."
Though athletes and advocates for women's ski jumping waged a battle to get the sport into the 2010 Olympics, the efforts and court cases failed in the months before the Games and women were not among the ski jumping competitors in the Callaghan Valley's Whistler Olympic/Paralympic Park (WOP) in February.
But they could one day take flight in the venue in World Cup competition, as a park official with the Whistler 2010 Sport Legacies society, which now controls the venue, expressed interest in pursuing discussions about hosting a women's ski jumping World Cup event.
John Heilig, the newly named sport manager for the WOP and past ski jumping manager for the Vancouver Olympic and Paralympic organizing committee (VANOC), said on Friday (June 11) that the venue doesn't bid for such events. National sport organizations such as Ski Jumping Canada would make the requests, and then find local organizers while the venue becomes a host and partner.
But Heilig said he thinks the women's ski jumping World Cup circuit is worth having at WOP.
"I think that's something that would be worth us working with Ski Jumping Canada on," Heilig said, adding, "We can't request it, but we can certainly work with our national sport organization We believe it would be a really good event to have."
He said he feels it would be especially good to get on the calendar for the new circuit because there are still some Canadian women who could perform at that level, though some of the top jumpers have retired from the sport or left the Canadian program. He also expressed a sense that Canada should step up to the plate as a "strong proponent" of women's ski jumping in the past, saying it would be "awesome" for the country to be involved in the start of the circuit.
"I think there's a lot of interest in Canada for women's ski jumping," including potential sponsors, Heilig said.
Heilig, who took part in the recent FIS Congress in Turkey as a committee member for Nordic combined, said work to build the women's ski jumping World Cup calendar is expected to start at the end of September.
As for the men's ski jumping and Nordic combined events, Heilig said he believes it might be more beneficial for the Canadian programs to focus on hosting Continental Cup events that might better benefit their up-and-coming young athletes, instead of more expensive and labour-intensive World Cup events.
"If your team isn't really benefiting from them, it doesn't make a lot of sense," he said.
It's also hard to break into the list of established venues on the men's ski jumping World Cup circuit, Heilig added, and it could be better to get into the women's circuit at the ground level. The WOP would have to coordinate with American venues, he added, and that might be more likely for the women's events.
Brent Morrice, head of Ski Jumping Canada, told the Vancouver Sun last week that the top Canadian female ski jumpers who participated in the struggle for Olympic inclusion had quit the sport. Katie Willis and sometime Whistler resident Zoya Lynch didn't jump last season, nor did Nata de Leeuw, but Morrice told the Sun he thinks de Leeuw might return.
"I think we will get her back She's a fantastic jumper," he told the Sun about the athlete who has 17 top-five results to her credit on the Continental Cup circuit, including two fourth-place finishes at Continental Cup events in Whistler in December 2008. "But it all depends on the IOC. She's not putting her life on hold (just) for World Cups."
Atsuko Tanaka competed for Canada on the Continental Cup circuit last season, finishing 40th, but Heilig said she is now competing for Japan. Still, Heilig said he's heard there are up-and-coming Canadian female jumpers who seem to have the skills.
"Some of the good skiers retired last year, but I think there's still enough at a reasonable enough level that I think it would be valuable for a national sport organization," Heilig said.
Having just been hired for his new position at the WOP this month, Heilig said the organizational team is still getting its feet on the ground, but have a clear idea of where they want to go and the desire to maintain the venue as an asset to the community.
In future years, he said, "I think there are going to be quite a few big events."
The North American biathlon championships are likely to take place here in the upcoming winter season, as well as, potentially, the national ski jumping championships at the end of March 2011. Other possible projected WOP events include a Cross-Country Canada event in December 2011, plus tentative plans for an International Paralympic Committee World Cup or world championship event in January 2012.
