Waiting For Alpine Events Was Almost All Pain

Lies, lies, delays and diversions.

Covering Alpine events at the Nagano Games felt like 16 days of sitting on an airport runway listening to Bob, the co-pilot, assuring all that it would take Vito the mechanic only “six or seven minutes, tops, to replace a hydraulic valve” when you know damn well that in 30 minutes you will be back at the terminal, scrambling to book another flight to Chicago.

The first 20 or 30 Alpine postponement announcements, I could handle. This is ski racing. Sleet happens.

It was the manner in which organizers strung us along, day after day, that ultimately sent me over the edge, a la Hermann Maier.

Typical day: Drag your rear out of bed, look out the window, see the tip of the motel shuttle bus antenna sticking out of a snow drift and conclude that the only people on skis today will be from Search and Rescue.

Still, you proceed to the venue, set up shop, and wait for the Ministry of Lies to disseminate misinformation.

It didn’t matter if there was a white-out raging, if the women’s downhill was supposed to start at 10:15 a.m, a nice woman from NAOC would enter the room and calmly announce:

“The downhill has been delayed until 10:30 a.m.”

This went on every 15 minutes for two weeks. It got to the point where each time someone entered with an update, some of us hacks would answer the announcements with, “Lie!”

It worked like this:

Woman: The men’s super-G has been delayed until 2:30.

Reporters: Lie!

Woman: The women’s combined downhill will now be. . . .

Reporters: Lie!

Woman: The women’s super-G has been rescheduled for. . . .

Reporters: Lie!

Woman: There is a blue car in the parking lot with its lights on.

Reporters: Lie!

It was 10 times worse for the Japanese fans, who braved horrific weather conditions only to be sent home disappointed.

By the time the men’s downhill was finally raced, five days after originally scheduled, most fans had given up, stayed home, and missed Maier’s Olympian crash.

As one colleague noted, “You can fool the Japanese one time, two times, three times, four, five, six, maybe seven times, but you can’t fool ‘em eight times.”

Too bad. The people here are wonderful. Some actually blamed themselves for the cruddy weather. Workers operated in ungodly conditions--snow, wind, sleet, hail, wind, lightning--yet always managed a smile.

Japan is truly a great place to visit. The Japan Alps, for all I know, may be a terrific place to lead an expedition.

But I would never, ever again hold a ski race there.