Race day at Crans Montana

It’s a typical Crans Montana morning: dazzling. The confident forecast is hard and fast racing conditions for the early starters in the Momentum City Ski Championships slalom; slush for the après midi skier and serious sunburn for those who forget … Continue reading

Skiing by night – a darkmotif

It is a small detail, rarely omitted from the story. The brothers Branger, Tobias and Johann, ski pioneers in Davos c1890, conducted their experiments under cover of darkness in order to avoid the mockery of their fellow Davonians. The Brangers’ … Continue reading

St Moritz in winter: too good to be true?

Winter sports is a competitive business, and rivalry has been a powerful spur to its development. In the early days of alpinism the arch rivals were Chamonix and Zermatt.  “The Matterhorn after all is not so fine a thing as … Continue reading

Mr Smith’s Olympics

  The Atlantic magazine of May 1936 published the journal of American ski racer Robert Livermore who travelled to the Alps for the Winter Olympics at Garmisch, with an excursion to Kitzbühel for the Hahnenkamm (“much better gelaende”) between practice runs.  … Continue reading

Skiing’s Literary Locations

Davos is the reading-man’s ski resort. How many times have I packed and started its set text The Magic Mountain, and nodded off on the train?   In the last third of the 19th century arty consumptive types beat a path … Continue reading