They were lucky to pull it off, and I'm glad that they did. The ONLY reason that they got it on the calendar was the USSA/USST making the pitch that Kilington can make better snow than anybody in North America. So, effectively very little risk. Better than another options. When things unfolded as they did, I had fingers and toes crossed that it would work out OK. I think it worked out better than OK. And luckily so, because if they had to cancel, they would have been pulled from the calendar this year, I bet.
So hopefully, Mother Nature and engineering work together for a rock hard surface.
Last year was a good example of how Euro-centric FIS is, as there were plenty of Euro alpine directors who were not pleased with the surface. FIS, at higher levels was delighted with the crowd, I'm told. Very good for the sport. I was standing with a long time WC coach about 20 yards from where Gut went out. He had it on video, and said "That's not good." Then said right then that he felt the Swiss were going to push to have the race thrown out. Which they tried. Even then, in November, they were counting on her grabbing 100 points there. Losing them might have already put her in a hole. Had to make that DNF go away.
Of course she had plenty of other screwups before she was injured later on. No lock for the overall, at all. Not close. But at the time, tempers were flaring....over the inability of the Americans, to get the surface right. The strongest woman GS skier on tour, and defending WC champ could not ski as she normally does. Yeah, she was very cool. The team....not so much. And of course they try to get others to join in on the bitching.
Which is pretty funny as a lot of races that time of year, have a history of being cancelled as they can't even pass snow control. As in NO snow.
Will be just great if everything works out this year. Great weather. Hard surface. Good racing. Huge crowds. That will be tremendous. Word is that the athletes really loved it.